Top guns open campaign in Digicel Senior Squash Championships

By Treiston Joseph  

All the top guns got into action on Wednesday evening during the first round of Digicel’s Senior Squash Championships, currently ongoing at the Georgetown Club Courts.

World-rated female star Nicolette Fernandes, who is also playing in the male category of the tournament, opened her quest to win the championship with a victory over Nicholas Norain.

Fernandes had a close first set that ended 12-10, but breezed through the remainder of the games with 11-2 and 11-1 set wins. Defending champion Alexander Arjoon also breezed through his match with Jonathan Antczak with 11-1, 11-2 and 11-2 set points win

Arjoon spoke to News Room Sport on his game as well as the competition he expects to face as the championships goes deeper.

“I have been preparing much more for this tournament, but it’s nice to get the first match out of the way…but definitely it is going to be tougher to win because the competition is much better this time, especially from the second round onwards,” Arjoon noted.

Arjoon added that while the competition will be tough his focus is on playing one match at a time.

“At the end of the day everybody is pretty even; the guys are seeded so the thing is on any day anybody could come and win and that’s how it’s been going leading up to this tournament, but once the ref says love all then we’ll know who is who,” Arjoon mentioned.

Meanwhile, Caribbean Motor Racing Champion Kristian Jeffrey showed his versatility with an easy win over Javid Rahaman 11-2, 11-1 and 11-3, while former Caribbean junior champ Jason Ray Khalil won in straight sets against Alex Cheeks 11-4, 11-4 and 11-4.

Nyron Joseph was also in the winner’s row, despite dropping a set to Peter Michael DeGroot with the match going 11-0, 4-11, 11-4 and 11-4. Also winning games in the Men’s category were Jean Claude Jeffrey over Ben Mekdeci and Shomari Wiltshire over Regan Pollard.

Meanwhile, in the Women’s category, Makeda Harding had to call on all her experience to defeat Abosaide Cadogan 11-4, 13-11, 7-11, 11-3, while Victoria Arjoon defeated Kirsten Gomes 11-5, 11-2, 11-5. In the other Women’s match, Sarah Lewis beat Madison Fernandes 13-11, 11-9, 11-9.

In Veteran’s action (35-49), Allan Downes topped Medhi Ramdhani, while Joe Mekdeci defeated Robin Low before returning to defeat Steven Persaud in the Veterans Over-50 category.

Action in the tournament will continue tonight at the same venue with the finals set for Saturday.