16-Mar-11:
The Draw is Done ...
The men's and women's Main Draws for the Cedrus Cayman Open were
done this week at Camana Bay, with mixed results for the local
players ...
 Cayman's
Marlene West
Marlene, currently ranked #114 in the world, was never going to
get an easy match in this tournament as all the main draw
players are in the world's top 14!
The 'weakest' player that she could have been paired against,
remembering that she has to play one of the top 8 seeds, would
have been the world #9!
Marlene's opponent is Rachael Grinham from Australia.
There's not much that Rachael hasn't achieved in squash. She's a
former world #1, former World Open Champion (2007), double
Commonwealth Games gold medalist and a semi finalist at last
year's Cayman Open. Rachael's current world ranking is #3, so
she's still one of the very best in the world.
Cayman's Other Female Players
 Cayman
has two other athletes in the Women's Draw, Wildcard entrants
Kristina Myren and Eilidh Bridgeman will play in the
16 player qualifying tournament. Kristina and Eilidh won a
silver and a bronze respectively at the 2010 Caribbean Junior
Championships.
The draw for the qualifying tournament will be done on March
2nd, with all of the international players ranked in the top 50
in the world.
CINSA have also given a wildcard to the only Caribbean woman
that is currently on the pro squash tour. World #48 and 2009
Caribbean Champion Nicolette Fernandes was given an entry
into the qualifying event.
Cayman's Men
Cayman's men had mixed results with this draw. With Cayman
players making up the most numbers in the draw, the odds were
that our players would have to play the big guns!
Myron Blair
Myron will be leading the charge by playing 2008 World Champion
and 2010 World #1 Ramy Ashour from Egypt. This will be a
great match and an excellent start to the tournament.
Gabe Rabess
Gabe was silver medalist at the recent National
Championships and is only recently getting back into playing. He
will be the underdog in his match against Shawn Simpson
from Barbados, but will certainly be capable of an upset here if
he plays his best squash. This should be a very entertaining
match to watch.
David Finch
Finch is the new Cayman National Champ and the Cedrus Cayman
Open will be a great chance for him to try to cause some upsets
under the Cayman flag. His opponent Gavin Cumberbatch
from Barbados is a seasoned regular at the Cayman Open and was
the 2007 Caribbean Champion. These two played last year in the
Caribbean Championships with Cumberbatch winning, but in a close
match.
 Cameron
Stafford
Cameron plays Van Rolle, the top junior from Bahamas.
Cameron is seeded to win this match, but nothing should be taken
for granted as his opponent is very talented and will make him
work.
Alex Frazer
The final Cayman player is Alex Frazer. Alex drew the world #19
from England Ali Walker. While we can't expect Alex to
win this match we know he'll put up a great fight and leave
everything on court.
All first round matches by the men will be played at South Sound
Squash Club.
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