Quarters Part One : Bryant joins top seeds in Semis

After three days and two rounds at the Squash Centre, it’s off to Ocean Park tonight for the first set of Quarter-Finals.

You can Watch Live on SquashTV, follow on Live Scoring and Socials, and we’ll have photos going into the Gallery and Reports and Reaction right here.

Top seeds ease into the semi-finals

Top seeded Egyptians Hania El Hammamy and Mostafa Asal advanced to the semi-finals with straight-game wins over Siva Subramaniam and Victor Crouin, both seeded seventh.

[1] Hania El Hammamy (Egy) 3-0 [7] Siva Subramaniam (Mas)    11-4, 11-9, 11-4 (33m)
[1] Mostafa Asal (Egy) 3-0 [7] Victor Crouin (Fra)    11-4, 11-2, 11-5 (39m)

In the opening match the Egyptian came flying out of the blocks and found her targets well to take the opening game 11-4. Despite racing into a 7-3 lead in the second, El Hammamy was pegged back to 7-7 but El Hammamy managed to hold her nerve to edge the second 11-9.

Aggressive squash from El Hammamy left Sivasangari short of answers in the third, as the top seed won the third 11-3 to progress to the last four.

Hania : “It’s weird getting to this stage playing only one match, but I just said I’d treat it like a Gold event and prepare in a slightly different way.”

Asal, who lost out to Crouin in their last meeting at the Silicon Valley Open, was very accurate from the off as Crouin struggled to contain the  World Champion who drew first blood with an 11-4.Errors were also proving costly for Crouin, who found the tin on a number of occasions in the second while Asal moved through the gears to double his lead  11-2. Crouin was unable to dislodge Asal from the ‘T’ going into the third, as Asal seal the match 11-5.

Mostafa : “It’s difficult to play Victor, he got the better of me in San Francisco, so I know if I’m not giving my 100% he can beat anyone. I’m really happy with everything tonight, tactics were spot on.”

Sherbini storms into semis as Bryant makes his first

Former champion Nour ElSherbini raced past Sabrina Sobhy while Jonah Bryant reached a first HK semi with a four game win over Leonel Cardenas.

[3] Nour El Sherbini (Egy) 3-0 Sabrina Sobhy (Usa)    11-5, 11-4, 11-8 (20m)
Jonah Bryant (Eng) 3-1 Leonel Cardenas (Mex)    12-10, 6-11, 11-3, 11-6 (57m)

Eight-time World Champion ElSherbini eased into the semi-finals after beating an injury-hampered Sabrina Sobhy in three games. After recording wins over her older sister Amanda and Egypt’s Kenzy Ayman, a hamstring injury hampered Sabrina’s movement as ElSherbini eased through.

ElSherbini : “We were both a bit surprised about the cold court conditions. I tried to take advantage of it as much as I could, I knew that she was struggling a bit in her movement, but I was just trying to stick to what I was doing and continue the way I was playing right until the end.”

England’s rising star Bryant delivered a high-quality performance to reach the second Platinum semi-final of his career. He was forced to work hard for his 55-minute victory, but after the first two games were shared Bryant assumed control in the final two games.

Bryant : “I feel great. As you can see, he’s a really tough competitor. I have a 3-0 head-to-head record but every single one has been so tough – the first one was 12-10 in the fifth, the second was 13-11 in the fourth, so I knew I was in for a tough battle. I did also expect myself to win though. In a big quarter-final, you’ve got to put pressure on yourself, but I thrive in those situations.”