Junior girls give reason to smile

GUERNSEY'S hugely-promising under-13 girls again provided the highlights as the Equity Trust island junior squad travelled to compete in the Irish Junior Open. Natalie Dodd, who was seeded 3/4, beat Issey Norman-Ross 3-0 in the second round only to fall in the semi-finals to Harriet Ingham, from England, 3-1, losing the fourth game 10-8.

In the third-and-fourth-place playoff, Dodd beat Sarah Howley, from Ireland, 3-0.

Norman-Ross, who has recently gone into the top 10 in the rankings, beat Gemma Owen, of Ireland, the 5/8 seed, in her first-round match, 3-1.

She then played Dodd, who proved to be too strong for her.

In her third match, Norman-Ross played Hannah-Jane Davis, from Wales, a match she won 9-6 in the fifth. The play-off for fifth and sixth place pitted Norman-Ross against another Sarnian, Katie Simpson. After 44min. play, the former won 3-2, 10-9 in the fifth.

Simpson, ranked 5/8, won her first match against Rachel Power, from Ireland, 3-0.

She then faced the number-one seed, Hannah Anthony, from Scotland. The Scot was too strong for her and she lost 3-0.

In the quarter-finals, Simpson played Lisa Morton, from Ireland, and won convincingly 3-0, only to come up against Norman-Ross in the play-off.

'The two girls are going to be playing each other for many years to come and at the moment Katie has a slight edge on Issey, although a lot depends on the day of the actual match who will be the winner,' said Peter Bridgeman, director of island squash.

'This is a good rivalry. The two are at the same school and in the same class and sometimes sit next to each other during lessons. They are pushing each other to their limits and they are a great asset for Guernsey squash, along with Natalie Dodd.'

Eight Equity Trust squad members competed in Belfast. There were more than 200 overall. Guernsey had two juniors in the U13 boys, three in the U17 boys and the three U13 girls.

Chris Ozard won his first match 3-0 against Connor Caheny, from Ireland. He then played another Irish junior, Eoin Dolan, but lost 3-0.

In his third-round match, he beat Ryan McHale 3-0 without dropping a point.

Next came Joel Brickell, from England, and Ozard came back from 0-2 down to win 3-2.

For his fifth match, he played Michael Albinson, from England, and lost a close match 3-0.

'That put Ozard 10th in the tournament and he had a great weekend in which he played a total of five matches,' said Bridgeman.

Guernsey's other representative in the U13 category, James Brehaut, was seeded 3/4 and had a bye in the first round.

In the second he beat McHale 3-0 without dropping a point, followed by a 3-0 defeat of Dolan.

However, that put him in the semi-finals against Nicholas Hopcroft, of England, the number-one seed, and unfortunately he went down 3-0.

In the third-and-fourth play-off, he played Declan James, from England, and after two close games, Brehaut was beaten 3-1 to finish fourth overall in the tournament.

Because of a large entry, there was an A and a B event in the U17 boys' competition.

Russell Moralee took part in the B, which unfortunately was reduced to six players, rather than the 10 who had entered.

Having won his first two matches quite easily against two Irish players, Phil Gray and Rory Cousins, he played Jake Mitchell from England in the final. Mitchell proved to be too strong on the day and ran out a 3-0 winner.

Henry Birch and Sam Shields were the two representatives in the U17 boys' A event.

'Sam played Kamran Khan, from Malaysia, in his first-round match and lost 3-0, but the match was very tight in the second and third games even though the score does not suggest that,' said Bridgeman.

In the second round, he played Brian Brennan, from Ireland, a match he won easily, 3-0.

Then came a clash with Birch. In a see-saw contest, Shields took a 2-0 lead only for Birch to bring the scores level before Shields won a decisive game, 9-3.

He then played Liam James, from England, but having taken an early lead, he did not show the form he had produced in the past few weeks and lost 3-1. In his final match, he faced Gordon Harpur, from Ireland, whom he beat 3-2 having lost the first two games. His final position was 19th.

Birch's first match was against Petr Martin, from the Czech Republic, who was the 3/4 seed. Birch lost 3-0 against a particularly strong opponent.

Next he faced Ireland's Carl Jess and produced a convincing win, dropping only one point.

Following the defeat against Shields, Birch went on to play Sean Caheny. After a close first game, he overpowered his opponent and won 3-0.

Birch finished 21st overall, because his final opponent, Edward Charlton, from England, was injured and could not take any further part in the tournament.

'This was a great experience for the two boys, having a total of five matches and from the results it is clear to see, while they are not yet up with the top boys, they are nowhere near the bottom,' said Bridgeman.

'These European events provide our juniors with the very tough match experience they need for their development. They are having to cope with not only all the travelling and organisation of themselves, but also having to play players from different countries in strange surroundings.

'The format allowed most of our players to have at least three matches and in most cases, on this particular weekend, our players had four or five.

'These tournaments are vital for the future development of our juniors in squash.'