There
is "no doubt"...that scheduling the Western Junior Regional Squash
Championships over a day-and-a-half ONLY had a detrimental effect on
the results and outcome of the boys under 17 division! As it turned
out, the #1 seed (Ahmad Haq) played the #4 seed (Eric Lin) in the top
half of the semi-final draw. The match was a Marathon, going five games
to extra points in the fifth game...Ahmad winning 13-11! So...Ahmad
went on to play the finals of the main draw. Eric went on to play the
3/4 play-off finals. However...the other semi-final (between Mohamed
Awadalla and Kamran Zia) was pretty-much a cut-and-dry
three-gamer...Mohamed coming out ahead to play Ahmad in the main-draw
finals, Kamran went on to play Eric in the 3/4 play-offs. Wouldn't it
have been nice (proper and logical) if the totally exhausted Ahmad and
Eric (having played two matches already on Saturday) could have had a
good-night's rest and played the main-draw and 3/4 play-off finals on
Sunday!? But NO...after having (less than) a two-hour rest, both boys
had to play their finals as a third match on the same day...Saturday!
The result and outcome of these two matches was easy to predict, as
Mohamed beat Ahmad in a relatively easy three-games...and Kamran beat
Eric in an relatively easy 3/4 play-off four-game match. We would hope
this serves as a good lesson and example of why or when there is the
potential for junior squash-players to play four matches in a
tournament, that the schedule permits them to have a decent rest before
playing the finals, as was so with All of the other seven Regional
Junior Squash Championships! We wondered...why would this event even be
accredited and/or sanctioned to be played in one-and-half
days...requiring the quarter's, semi's and finals to be played ALL on
the same day!? The kids work so very hard in preparing to enter and
play in these important ranking junior squash-tournaments, not to
mention the coaches and parents committing the time and resources to
get and be with them, loss of school, work, etc. Every effort should be
made to give these junior squash-players every opportunity to play
their very best..."No doubt!"
