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 English
Junior Racketball Championships 2011
18-19 June, Hallamshire, Sheffield |
Falconers and Townley
triumph at Racketball finals
Oli Turner reports...
 Sunday
saw the semi finals and finals of the national junior
Racketball champs hosted by Hallamshire Tennis and Squash
club. (Sorry it wasn’t up last night, I decided to take a
well earned rest after being at the club 9am -8pm!)
The morning kicked off with the BU15 semi finals
where there was an easy victory for number one seed Harry
Falconer, defeating Leicestershire’s Joe Sibley 11-2, 11-6,
11-6. However the other semi final was as dramatic and
gruelling as anyone could have wished for. 2 seed Joe Yerrel
was defeated by Hallamshire’s Alex Musselwhite 3-2, 11-9 in
the fifth in an astounding 80 minutes!
Joe, feeling hard done by the ref all throughout the match
was clearly annoyed and even more so when Alex was awarded a
stroke on match ball which Joe clearly felt was harsh. Alex
and the Hallamshire contingent delighted as they had a
finalist, Joe frustrated at missing out on the final.
The GU15 round robin then got underway for the second
day with Lucy Ward comfortably slotting away Isabel Chalmers
3-0. There was also a win for Charlotte Jagger over 2 seed
Chloe Widdowson, making the 2 seeds chances of finishing
where she was seeded impossible. (May I just say that up
until this point at 11 o’clock, I was still in bed so it has
been hard to report on these early matches!)
Next up was the GU19 semi finals. These sets of
matches were eagerly anticipated as number one seed Lucy
Townley took on UK number two Matilda Parslow and
Abbeydale’s number two seed Jade Thompson took on
Hallamshire’s Sophie Mullins in a battle of the two
Sheffield squash clubs.
Lucy looked in good form taking the first game with relative
ease 11-8 looking in first gear. However, Lucy quickly found
herself 4-0 down in the first finding back her length to
take the game 11-8 again. The 3rd also followed the same
fashion as the first two with Lucy looking in control and
comfortable. At 6-6 in the third it looked very much like
Matilda could make a late surge to snatch a game but Lucy
yet again closed the game out 11-8 and the match with it.
The other semi final was an anti climax as well. Eagerly
anticipated from an on looking Hallamshire crowd ready to
cheer there golden girl Sophie Mullins on. However, there
was no cheering as Jade used a hard attacking length and an
effective trickle boast to win the first 11-5 with relative
ease.
From then Jade grew in confidence taking the second 11-4. A
spirited push from Sophie earned her a 3-1 lead in the
third, but Jade so confident at the front of the court
closed the match out with ease, 11-5. Lucy and Jade in the
final, Sophie and Matilda left to contest the ¾ playoff.
The next round of matches was the BU19 semi finals (I
was playing at this point so didn’t really see a lot of any
of either semi! I won 3-0 securing second in the BU17!)
My bookies bet and three seed Oli Palmer defeated a
resilient two seed Charlie Yerrel. Oli closed out the first
11-5, but was given a stern test in the second in a contrast
of playing styles. Oli very dominant on the T, playing a
slow and accurately game, compared to Charlie who hit the
ball at a hard pace but in the end did too much chasing with
Oli taking the second 11-8.
The third was a different matter though with Charlie hitting
a more flatter and accurate length leaving Oli too do the
chasing! He was rewarded with a 10-7 lead and three game
balls which he didn’t take! Oli so reliable and accurate
managed to take the third, 12-10, closing out the game 3-0.
The other semi was also a contrast in styles. Number one
seed Hamish Falconer, renowned for his slow paced length
game and dominating the T was up against Fourth seed from
Kent Elliot Knight. I don’t think it would be fair to call
Elliot a ‘hacker’ but he sure can hit the ball hard but
importantly accurately giving opponents zero time on the
ball. Unfortunately I joined the game at 2-2 (and I don’t
have the game scores beforehand! (Sorry poor reporting I
know!))
With Hamish controlling the game at 8-4. Elliot looked the
more tiered of the two and understandably so, punching the
ball up and down the line. Frustrated by Hamish’s domination
of the T, Elliot made costly error’s punching the glass back
wall in annoyance as he lost the fifth 11-6, ending his
chances of being National Junior Racketball Champion. Hamish
and Oli in the final.
After a lunchtime break the final round of the GU15 draw
got underway. Lucy Ward confirmed her championship victory
over two seed Chloe Widdowson (had a nightmare tournament
and finished fourth!). Lucy looked in control all over the
match winning 3-0 with ease to give her bragging rights over
all of her over training partners! With the champion crowned
there was the small matter of second place.
Grace Spink and Charlotte Jagger (already GU13 champ)
battled out an intense 3-2 with grace edging it 11-9 in the
fifth. Grace clearly overjoyed with her second place
position gave the fist pump at the end of the fifth!
Charlotte clearly not pleased escaped quickly to avoid the
wrath of her disappointed parents!
Next up was the BU15 final, with Joe Yerrel already
claiming 3rd spot beating Joe Sibley 3-0 comfortably. Harry
Falconer who had already claimed the BU13 title and not
dropped a game in the tournament so far faced Hallamshire’s
Alex Musselwhite.
On paper it looked quite a one sided match with Harry having
the prestige of a British Junior open quarter final, a
British closed winner’s trophy and a semi finalist on the
English champs (please note these are all BU13) compared to
Alex who has no squash prestige as he doesn’t play it!
Harry, confidently took the first 11-6 with ease against a
nervous Alex, clearly over oared by the occasion. However,
Alex calmed his nerves to race to a 10-6 lead. Alex though,
had trouble closing the game out as the nerves returned with
some costly errors giving Harry a way back in at 10-9. Alex
though closed the game out 11-9 with a low hack leaving it
at 1-1.
Harry though, showed his experience taking the third 11-3
and the fourth 11-5 giving him the match 3-1 and the double
title of BU13 and BU15 champ. 8th place John James Cummiskey
took the 2nd spot in the BU13 finishing 8th in the BU15
draw. However I would like to see his birth certificate as I
have some queries about his age! (He would probably get
served in a bar!)
In the GU19 draw, Hallamshire’s Sophie Mullins
claimed third spot over Chapel Allerton’s Matilda Parslow,
3-2 in games it was a rollercoaster the whole way through
which could have gone either way. Matilda however still
claimed the GU17 title with 8th place Holly Moore finishing
second in the GU17.
This just left the final, with Lucy starting the brighter
with a 4-0 lead. Jade resilient and full of fighting spirit
tried to counjer a late comeback in the first but went down
11-7. Lucy looked comfortable in the second, always in
control with jade consistently placing it in the tin for
her! Gave Lucy the second game, 11-4. Jade put a spirited
performance in the third finding herself 7-5 up but, Lucy
was too accurate, regaining her length she managed to close
out the match, taking the third 11-8 and taking the GU19
title.
The BU19 final was expected to be a cracker, with one
seed Hamish Falconer, already BU17 champion looked to add
the BU19 championship to his already prestigious squash and
Racketball career. However, he was to face a stern test in
the face of 17 year old Oli Palmer.
Yet to drop a game and my bet win the comp he was as fresh
as a daisy with a relatively short match compared to
Hamish’s monster epic with Elliot Knight. However, Hamish
showed the crowd why he was favourite to take the title
winning a closely contested first game 11-8. With both
players playing a steady, slow, accurate game the rallies
were long and very brutal with Oli on the end of most of
them! Oli tried to move Hamish from the T but the lanky
Lincolnshire player was too strong, too accurate, too
consistent, Hamish taking the second 11-8 and showing no
sign of fatigue.
The third was a bit of an anti-climax. Oli never really got
into the form that he showed in the previous rounds and
found the intense pressure from Hamish too strong. Hamish,
like a rock on the T confidently played the ball into the
nick to take the game, 11-3 and the match. With it, the
prestigious title of the best junior Racketball player in
the country.
Overall a great weekend of Racketball. Hopefully next year
we will get more entries so the tournament can be even
bigger and even more prestigious. A date has already been
arranged with ESR for the 21st and 22nd of April 2012.
Hopefully next year we can have someone who can stop one of
the Falconer’s as they have not yet lost a match in the 2
years of the event!
For me, I am switching my racket and am off to Cologne and
Amsterdam for the Pioneer and Dutch junior open. Hopefully I
can have more look than I did this weekend!
Thank you for reading these series of articles and hopefully
see you next year.
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Sat
18th, Day ONE:
Seeds flying at Hallamshire
Oli Turner
reports...
Today
saw the first two rounds (three for BU15!) of this year’s
Dunlop National Junior Racketball championship. With matches
scheduled to be played from 9am – 6pm it was sure to be a
very busy day at the Hallamshire!
BU17/19 draw
The BU19
draw got underway at 10am with the top 3 seeds all getting
byes. There were no real upsets with Jonathan Pitts
3-1 victory over Devon’s Tom Temple-Murray being the
pick of the bunch from the first round. The quarter finals
got underway with Lincolnshire’s Hamish Falconer
defeating Jonathan 11-3, 11-5, 11-4. Looking
comfortable and surprised at his own performance after
confessing that he has only picked up a Racketball racket
twice, since his victory last year! Hamish controlled
the T throughout the match leaving Jonathan clueless
whether to play attacking or go defensive. In the end he did
neither! As he went down in stylish fashion! (I liked his
through the legs shot on match ball!)
Two seed Charlie Yerrel looked comfortable against
Worcestershire Jack Lubke. The UK Racketball Kent
open B grade winner strolled to a 11-5, 11-4, 11-5 victory.
Fourth seed Elliot Knight also looked in control as
he defeated Warwickshire’s Andrew Lindsay 3-0, 11-8,
11-5, 11-8. This left one match left in the BU19 quarter
finals Myself, Oli Turner against Edgbaston Priory’s
up and coming squash junior Oli Palmer.
I must admit although I was seeded to lose the game, I was
feeling confident after having a string of good Racketball
results recently and a men’s national ranking of 64, I
thought that I may have already had this one in the bag.
However, I was wrong to be over confident as a reliable
Oli Palmer showed why he is one of the favourites to
take the title defeating me 11-5, 11-7, 11-2! Not a good day
for me, and what rubbed the salt into the wounds even more
for me, was when he told me that he had only been playing
Racketball for a month!
I can’t fault my performance, Oli is possibly the
best Racketball player I have come across in my short career
and is now my bet to win the competition. I am sure the
Hamish, Charlie and Elliot have something
to say about that though!
The semi’s are evenly poised with Hamish facing
Elliot and Charlie playing Oli. There is
always next year for me... hopefully!
GU17/19 draw
The GU19
draw kicked off with a preliminary match for the honour of
playing number one seed Lucy Townley. Alicia
Sewell defeating Holly Moore 3-0. The GU19
Quarters then got underway with number one seed Lucy
Townley not in a mood for hanging around, defeating
Alicia 11-2, 11-4, 11-3.
Number two seed Jade Thompson looked as impressive
with a reassuring victory over Rebecca Gill (it was only
second time Jade had played Racketball!!). The score
11-2, 11-2, 11-5. UK number two Matilda Parslow also
booked her place in the semi finals when she beat fellow
Chapel Allerton compatriot Emma Stallworthy, 3-0. She
now faces Lucy in what could be one of the matches of
the tournament so far.
The last semi final spot was contested by two Hallamshire
juniors. Sophie Mullins, granddaughter of the
current Hallamshire squash coach John Mullins
(looking good in his 60’s I must say!) took four games to
beat last year’s semi finalist Sarah Gill. With all
Hallamshire interest on that court, there was a packed crowd
to see Sophie take the first two games before
Sarah dug hard to win the third 11-9.
However, Sophie prevailed in four, taking the game
11-6. Sophie now faces Jade in the battle of
the Sheffielders, Hallamshire vs. Abbeydale.
BU13/15 draw
With the
BU15 draw boasting the biggest entry (20 players) and three
rounds to be played today, there was a lot of Racketball to
be played in this age group.
After some early preliminary rounds in the morning the last
16 got underway with comfortable wins for all the top seeds
who faced lesser opposition in the face of Hallamshire youth
players. However, the 5/8 seeds had trouble making it
through to the quarter-finals with all of them dropping a
game or more! The pick of the bunch being Christopher
Rej’s (7) win over Jonny Rossiter (10), going all
the way to 14-12 in the5th!
The quarter-finals were much of the same matter with
comfortable wins for Harry Falconer, Joe Yerrel
and Alex Musselwhite, all 3-0. However, fourth seed
Joe Sibley had trouble overcoming Hallamshire’s
Matt Boyle as he had to endure 50 mins of court time and
5 games of Racketball to oversee the fifth seed. With Joe
2-1 up and 10-6 up, he looked sure to book his place in the
semi final but some dodgy marking from myself!, handed
Matt a way back into the match, taking the fourth 15-13.
Unfortunately for Matt, Joe overcame his
nerves and booked his place in the semis with a very
professional performance, 11-4 in the fifth. Falconer
faces Sibley, Yerrel faces Musselwhite.
GU13/15 draw
None of
the girls showed any signs of tiredness as they were on the
court at 9am sharp, being the first scheduled matches on.
Chloe Widdowson and Lucy Ward got off to great
start’s both winning 3-0 over Isabel Chalmers and
Grace Spink respectably, but Chloe could not keep
her form with an unexpected loss to Grace, 3-0.
Charlotte Jagger then got her Racketball campaign
underway with a 3-0 victory over Isabel Chalmers,
meaning that Isabel could not win the tournament
already at this early stage.
The last GU15 matches then got away at 2:40 with Lucy
Ward beating Charlotte Jagger and Grace Spink
beating Isabel Chalmers, both 3-0. There are two more
rounds of the GU15 round robin... With Lucy poised to
retain her title.
Yet again,
play starts from the Hallamshire at 9am with the BU19 final
scheduled at 5pm. Entry to watch is free of charge so get
down to the club to see the finest Racketball talent in
England.
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Preview
from Oli Turner
This
weekend at Hallamshire tennis and squash club sees the
second ever National Junior Racketball Champs, this year
sponsored by Dunlop.
The competition sees some of the country’s most enthusiastic
Racketball youngsters go head to head in four different
draws all going for the title of being national junior
Racketball champ.
The event, being hosted at Hallamshire tennis and squash
club is one of the UK’s most successful Racketball clubs
with over 1000 squash and Racketball members, a semi final
position in the national Racketball club champs, a junior
Racketball development programme which has over 100 kids in
it and a Racketball summer league with over 230 players in
it! Situated on Eccelsall Road in Sheffield, the club is
close to the city centre and local parks.
This year due to a lack of entries the event has had to be
run in BU/GU15 and BU/GU19 draws instead of the traditional
8 draws ranging from BU/GU13 to BU/GU19. However, there will
still be U13 and U17 champions crowned as the highest
position in the BU19 draw would claim the BU17 title.
Lincolnshire’s Hamish Falconer is favourite to be
crowned BU19 champion at the age of 15 and the winner of
Dunlop squad status with it. However, last year’s BU15
winner will face tough opposition in the face of
Buckinghamshire’s Charlie Yerrel who is seeded two
for the event. It will not be a foregone conclusion that the
top seeds will be in the final though as Edgbaston Priory’s
Oliver Palmer (3) and Kent’s Elliot Knight (4)
will look to upset the seedings, as well as Jack Lubke
(61 in the UK) and myself, Oli Turner (64 in the UK)
a coach at Hallamshire and Abbeydale, I am sure to have the
crowd behind me and will hopefully manage to upset the
seedings and take the BU19 crown!
The GU19 draw is also an unpredictable one. Cheshire’s
Lucy Townley (1) is expected to claim the crown but
Sheffield’s own Jade Thompson (2) will have other
ideas as she is seeded to meet Lucy in the final. Jade is
seeded to meet Hallamshire’s own and last year’s runner up
Sophie Mullins (3) in the semi which on paper looks a
very close match.
Lucy also has a very tough match in the face of Matilda
Parslow (4). Matilda, currently ranked 2 in the UK for
women’s Racketball and winner at UK Racketball’s Ilkeston
tournament, she will surely be out to prove that she should
have been given the status of number one seed by trying to
attempt to take out Lucy in the semi. Chapel Allerton’s
Emma Stallworthy (5) could also be a ringer as an
established junior squash player, she will surely be out to
upset the seedings.
The BU15 draw is also as unpredictable as any of the other
draws. Lincolnshire’s Harry Falconer (1) will look to
follow in his brothers footsteps by adding the BU15 title to
his already impressive prestige and go one better than last
year when he won the BU13 title. Harry is seeded to meet
Charlie’s brother Joe Yerrel (2) in the final in what
could be battle of the families! (Hamish and Charlie are
seeded to meet in the final of BU19!).
However, there could be an unknown ringer in Hallamshire’s
Alex Musslewhite (3) who Hallamshire’s coach John
Mullins speaks very highly of, insisting that he has a great
chance of becoming crowned BU15 champion.
The rest of the BU15 draw is almost impossible to predict as
most of the kids are part of Hallamshire’s Racketball junior
intake. However, there are surely going to be a few ringers
in the draw with Joe Sibley (4), Christopher Rej
(7), James John Cummiskey (9) and Kieran
Shelley (17) (Kieran being the ripe old age of 10!) All
established squash players competing regularly in England
squash and Racketball sanctioned events.
The GU15 draw has 5 competitors in it. All from Hallamshire!
The pick of the bunch has to be Lucy Ward (1) who won
it last year and Chloe Widdowson (2), Lucy’s training
partner! This event will be played in a round robin format.
Matches start from 9am on Saturday morning and is scheduled
to finish Sunday afternoon with the BU19 final on last at
5pm. Entry to watch the event is free of charge, so make
sure you get down to Hallamshire to watch some of the finest
Racketball talent in the UK.
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