DVD - pro matches
DVD - instructional
HiTec Shoes
PRINCE Racquet Lineup
Also in SquashTalk eStore:
   Squash Racquets
   Shoes
   Videos - DVDs
   Books etc

Mudge & Berg Make it Five Straight
By Rob Dinerman, Mar 4, 2008    
Squashtalk Independent News; © 2008 SquashTalk LLC

Grainger Earns Two Wins

These days nothing --- not a different ball and scoring format, not altitude, not the best that the powerful remainder of the ISDA field has to offer, can derail what has become the Damien Mudge/Viktor Berg juggernaut, which swept to victory this past weekend at the Denver Athletic Club to win their fifth ISDA crown (preceded by Boston, Greenwich, Cleveland and Brooklyn) in as many events in calendar 2008. Mudge and Berg were forced to a fifth game in the final --- the only match in the entire tourney to exceed the three-game minimum – while dealing as well with the mile-high altitude, the consequent use of the red singles hardball rather than the blue doubles ball (which produced visual as well as performance issues, especially given the tendency of the paint in the host club’s walls to “whiten” the ball as play progressed) and the one-time experiment of having each game go to only 11 points (to win a team needed a clear margin of two points if the score became tied at 10) rather than the customary 15. The thought was that this novelty would keep the matches from lasting too long, which it did to an excessive enough degree (none of the pre-final matches lasted longer than 45 minutes) to make it unlikely that this format will resurface anytime soon.

Unperturbed by any of these first-time challenges, Mudge and Berg sailed past first qualifiers Eric Vlcek and Yvain Badan and then Chris Walker and Clive Leach (whose frustration with their top-seeded opponents’ ubiquity eventually produced too many errors to keep the score close) to reach the final. There they confronted “favorite son” Preston Quick, who leaned the game as a youngster at the host club and whose father, former USSRA President Taylor, is a prominent committee member there, and John Russell, straight-set semis victor over the sagging 2006-07 No. 1’s Paul Price and Ben Gould. The latter pairing had barely defeated Russell/Quick one week earlier in a taut Heights Casino semi before being thrashed by Mudge/Berg in the ensuing final. The rematch in Colorado was never in doubt, as Price was having trouble seeing the ball well and Quick’s tactic of hitting NARROW lobs at him, rather than ones that hit the left side wall, was keeping Price from setting up his forehand (which is deadly even from the back wall) and forcing weak responses which both his opponents constantly exploited as the 11-4, 7 and 6 tally moved swiftly along.

The Monday-night final, the only real test of the weekend for either team, may have swung on the last few points of the third game, when with Russell/Quick serving at 10-9, game-ball, with a chance to go up two games to one, Mudge nailed a well-placed backhand cross-court that forced a Quick error, after which the top seeds took both points of the tiebreaker. They then were out-played in the fourth game, by which time a pattern had been established wherein whichever team took a several-point early-game lead would be home free, as the 11-point format made it notably difficult for any trailing team to mount a successful rally. This put a real premium on the opening portion of the fifth game, in which Mudge and Berg asserted themselves and never looked back in finishing off the 11-8 5-11 12-10 6-11 11-4 final.

WOMENS ACTION

This tournament was the first all season to constitute feature not only an ISDA but also a WDSA (Women’s Doubles Squash Association) draw (the third of this organization’s inaugural season), which also made possible a Mixed event as well. Both of these latter two events utilized the regular 15-point scoring. In the women’s event, top seeds Natalie Grainger and Jess Dimauro, stung by the four-game defeat they suffered against Demer Holleran and Narelle Krizek in Rye a few weeks ago (after winning the debut tourney over Krizek and Steph Hewitt in Greenwich in November), raced through their three matches without dropping a game, overwhelming first Orla O’Doherty and Marci Sier, then 2007 U. S. National champions Fiona Geaves and Meredeth Quick and finally Krizek and her sister Natarsha McElhinny. The runners-up had won a four-game semi over Lee Belknap and Emily Lungstrum, who had previously rallied from love/two down to overtake Catherine MacLeod and Marie Vlcek.

Grainger proceeded to win the Mixed tournament as well, teaming with Walker to successfully defend the title they had won a year ago, when they had defeated the ’06 U. S. National Mixed champion Quick siblings in the final. This time they had their rematch with the Quicks in a straight-game semi while Price and Krizek (who had defeated the Quicks by one point in the fourth game of the ’07 U. S. Mixed final) were subduing Geaves and Matt Jenson 3-0 in the top-half semi. Price displayed more energy and passion in the subsequent Mixed final than he had the day before in his ISDA semi, but the outcome was the same, as Grainger, who demonstrated her versatility by winning playing the right wall with Walker and the left wall with Dimauro, and Walker created too much offense for their Aussie opponents to repulse.

NEW ... Get the New Jonathon Power Instruction Video at the SquashTalk eStore!

\

Squashtalk.com All materials © 1999-2008. Communicate with us at info@squashtalk.com.
Published by Squashtalk LLC, PO Box 2918, Acton, MA 01720 USA, Editor and Publisher Ron Beck,
Graphics editor Debra Tessier, Pro editor Martin Bronstein, Doubles editor Rob Dinerman.
Send comments, ideas, contributions and feedback to the webmaster. Copyright © 1999-2008 SquashTalk, all rights reserved, may not be reproduced in any form except for one-time personal use
Squashtalk.com must always be explicitly credited.