[3] Olli Tuominen (Fin) 3-0 [Q] Clinton Leeuw (Rsa)
                   13/11, 13/11, 11/5 (43m)
Jens Schoor (Ger) 3-0 Aqeel Rehman (Aut)
                  11/9, 11/9, 11/3 (39m)
Steve Finitsis (Aus) 3-0 Nathan Lake (Eng)
                  11/8, 11/2, 11/4 (32m)
[2] Adrian Grant (Eng) 3-0 Jan Koukal (Cze)
                  12/10, 11/6, 11/9 (50m)

Raphael Kandra (Ger) 3-0 [Q] Geoffrey Demont (Fra)
                  11/1, 11/6, 11/5(24m)
[1] Laurens Jan Anjema (Ned) 3-0 [Q] Declan James (Eng)
                  11/6, 11/7, 11/3 (42m)
Lucas Serme (Fra) 3-0 Sebastiaan Weenink (Ned)
                  11/9, 11/3, 11/9 (50m)
[4] Mathieu Castagnet (Fra) 3-0 Kristian Frost (Den)
                  12/10, 11/8, 11/7 (83m)

Seeds safely through to quarters

Tournament favourites Laurens Jan Anjema, Adrian Grant, Olli Tuominen and Mathieu Castagnet all made it safely through to the quarter finals of the Double AR Rotterdam Open Squash 2013 in the Netherlands.

Top seeded Anjema took 42 minutes to see-off in-form qualifier Declan James. The 30-year old top seed from The Hague dominated play from start to finish and never looked in danger of losing in front of a near-capacity audience on the show court of the renowned Victoria sporting club.

Grant, Tuominen and Castagnet also came through without dropping a game, although all of them had to work very hard for it. Grant survived three game-balls in the opening game against Czech number one Jan Koukal, before taking control of the match. European champion Tuominen needed two narrow tie-break wins to break the spirit of South Africa’s Clinton Leeuw, whilst Castagnet just got the better of Kristian Frost (Denmark) in a 83-minute match to finish of the first round main draw action.

Other first round winners at the new PSA Challenger 15 championship were Raphael Kandra (3-0 vs. Geoffrey Demont), Lucas Serme (3-0 vs. wildcard Sebastiaan Weenink), Steve Finitsis (3-0 vs. Nathan Lake) and Jens Schoor (3-0 vs. Aqeel Rehman).

Friday’s quarter final line-up Tuominen vs. Schoor (6.30pm), Grant vs. Finitsis (7.30pm). Anjema vs. Kandra (8.30pm) and Castagnet vs. Serme (9.30pm).

Match by Match ...

The first round of the main draw kicked off with Olli Tuominen and Clinton Leeuw who locked in a tight fierce battle, even though rankings suggest otherwise.

Both played at an extremely high intensity really demonstrating the physicality of the game and nothing separated the two players, however Olli somehow managed to get the last couple of points. Clinton couldn’t sustain the tempo in the 3rd, giving Olli the match 13/11, 13/11, 11/5 (43mins).

With only 13 ranking spots separating these two players, there was no telling how the match would end up between Jens Schoor and Aqeel Rehman.

This is exactly what happened with Jens displaying some great finesse in the front corners and Aqeel showing great patience with a combination of attack. At the end it seemed that Jens was able to close the games and had too much for Aqeel, wining 11/9, 11/9, 11/3 (39mins)

DoubleAr sponsored player Steve Finitsis started his campaign today against the upcoming Nathan Lake. Steve has shown some great form in recent times winning the Tasmanian Open and making the finals of the Victorian Open and Buler Squash Challenge.

Nathan was able to keep up with Steve until the middle part of the first game, but Steve’s skills and ability to kill the ball and hit the nick, combined with his athleticism was too good, winning comfortably 11/8, 11/2, 11/4 (32mins)

Another DoubleAr sponsored player, Adrian Grant, took a close first game against Jan Koukal. Both players have a similar style and it was expected Adrian would end up on top given his ranking and career experience.

After the first Adrian was too good for Jan, who never gave up, winning 12/10, 11/6, 11/9 (50mins).

Raphael Kandra started very strongly against Geoffrey Demont who took a scalp yesterday to make it into the main draw. Geoffrey seemed very nervous and made a slow start against Raphael who was not going to mess around.

Even thought Geoffrey started to settle down, Raphael was too good in the end winning comfortable 11/1, 11/6, 11/5 (24mins)

Number 1 seed and local superstar, Laurens Jan Anjema, started his campaign tonight against Declan James in front of a packed crowd. Declan, having 2 tough matches to make it into the main draw and having won first tour title last weekend, definitely showed he is a player to look out for in the future, as he kept up against LJ in the front half of the games.

However fatigue seemed to kick in, as LJ showed his experience on the bigger points towards the back end of the game. LJ won 11/6, 11/7, 11/3 (42mins)

Lucas Serme started tonight against Sebastiaan Weenink, who is played in front of a home crowd by receiving the wildcard to the tournament. The match started with Seb playing confidently and keeping a lead, giving Lucas no room to play his shots.

However Lucas found some momentum and took the first by coming from behind. The second was a turnaround of events as Seb lost his confidence combined with Lucas finding his shots and taking a second game quick game.

The third started like the first but Seb attacked to the front as well and took a lead. Once again Lucas maintain his patient style waiting for the opening to again to take the match by coming from behind: 11/9, 11/3, 11/9 (50mins).

The last match of the night promised to be a long one with both Kristian Frost and Mathieu Castagnet having similar styles of play. This is surely what happened as we were treated to some extraordinary long rallies at a very high pace.

The match also consisted of a large number of lets, complaining and dives. However Mathieu seemed to take the last couple of points in each game earning him the win after an extremely long 3 set match 12/10, 11/8, 11/7 (83mins).