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Ong Beng Hee:
April Player of the Month

Ong Beng Hee, former world junior champion from Malaysia, is closely watched by his many fans in Malaysia. With a training camp in the UK, he has made a rapid rise through the PSA rankings, capped by his semi-final berth at Hurghada last week.

[related story: Ong applies for UK residency]

April 15, 2001, Hurghada. © 2001 SquashTalk

Photos: Debra Tessier squashphotos.com © 2001

By Martin Bronstein
Ong Beng Hee had the slightly embarrassing, if happy, task of asking Organiser Andrew Shelley to postpone his flight from Hurghada to England. He'd booked to go back the day of the semi-finals not thinking that he would get past the quarters. But with some solid play founded on his ever-increasing maturity, Beng Hee had played his way into the semi-finals of the PSA Masters for his first ever meeting with Jonathon Power.

The young Malaysian's second round match against Alex Gough, ranked 12, one place above him, was a two hour, five-game grind. Trailing 7-13 in the fifth it seemed that he had been right in his flight booking. But noticing Gough was cramping, Beng Hee kept each rally going as long as possible and pulled up to 14-all. Gough called no set and during the rally seemed to fall over his own feet to give Beng Hee the victory - just.

In the quarters he faced local favourite Omar El Borolossy, who had been doing some giant -killing of his own, to the delight of the Egyptian crowds. In his next match Beng Hee beat El Borolossy despite the vocal support for his opponent. It was an 82 minute 3-1 victory and good preparation for his semi-final match against the world number one who was playing better, faster, sharper than ever.

Like Power's previous opponents, Beng Hee went down in three straight, but kept Power on court for 52 minutes, longer than any other player. His tight, controlled shots forced Power to be patient and Beng Hee rarely opened up the court to give Power the freedom of the city.

It was good to watch and a long way from the first time I saw Ong Beng Hee as a16 year old, also in Egypt, playing in the world junior championships in 1996. He floated around the court, held the racket in his own unique way and had his own vision of the game of squash: feathery drops and lobs. I wrote at the time that he played squash in slow motion. He lost in the quarters which included Stewart Boswell of Australia and Lee Beachill of England, who are also now ranked in the world's top twenty.

There followed a year of coaching with Jamie Hickox, the Anglo-Canadian, and then some time with Neil Harvey. Two years later in Princeton, Beng Hee won the world junior championship as we all knew he would. His game had changed a little and his father said that Harvey had made him tougher. Since then the immensely likeable and impeccably behaved Ong Beng Hee has been part of the Neil Harvey team (which he outlines below) and lives just outside London when he is not on the road. We spoke in the garden of the Grand Resort in Hurghada.

What was the major difference between junior and senior squash?
In the juniors I used to get through the first two rounds very easily. In the seniors I would be struggling in the second round like I was against Alex Gough in Hurghada. Seniors are a lot stronger. As a junior I was never fit, my squash was good enough to beat the rest of the juniors. But if I played a senior it was a lot harder and the matches were a lot longer. Seniors volley a lot more than the juniors.

I found it very difficult, after winning the world junior title to go on to the senior tour. There is a very big gap and I had to do a lot of catching up. I'm very glad that I train with players like Peter Nicol.

I noticed that he was advising you between games.
Yes, I train with him every day and we're team -mates. But if I'm playing an English player, because he is now part of the England team, he won't advise me. But as long as I'm playing somebody else, we help out each other.

We are all with Neil Harvey, there's six or seven of us including Peter Genever, Tim Garner, Lee Jemmett, Tim Wyant from the US, and sometimes Linda Charman-Smith. We do routines but as if we are playing a match. There are different 'conditions', like playing length, but we play it like a match. When you look back at yourself a year ago, how have you changed? Last year at this time I was ranked 44 and now I'm 13th. I am a lot stronger now and I can cope with the ten top players.

How did you get stronger?
It's from training with Neil Harvey. He does a very hard course and I thought this is what I need to get to the top. When I was training with Jamie Hickox, he said the only thing I was lacking was strength. Now I'm in the gym three times a week for strengthening exercises, but when I am playing league matches and tournament, I try for just once a week.

Are you surprised at your rapid rise up the rankings?
Yes. But after the British Open, where I got a good draw and made the best of it, I was confident that I would make the top twenty. I don't look behind me at the players coming up because I am still looking at the top ten. I beat David Evans (World number three) in the Flanders Open and that gave me a lot of confidence. I know that Pete Nicol and Jonathon Power are a class above, but from three, four and five, I've got a good chance of, if not beating them, giving them a good run.

I get confidence from not only winning but playing well. Even if I lose, if I feel I played well and given one hundred percent, that gives me confidence. If I lose to a player in three, than I work on it and next time I play him, I try to get a game off him and then take it from there.

Now that you are reaching the quarters and finals, you have to handle four or five hard matches in a row. How are you handling that?
Well, it's not as hard as training. Training is very hard work, you do six days and you don't get a day off. So by comparison a tournament is easier, you have just one match a day.

How has your game improved?
Technically, I've improved my swing since I've been with Neil. I used to have a really big swing and it took a long time to hit the ball but now it's not so big and much more consistent. I basically went back to step one. It was drastic and I found it hard to cope, changing my swing and my movement. The year after winning the world junior's, I suddenly felt like a beginner again. I decided that I had to do it then or struggle and be in the top 40 and be happy with that. I have always wanted to be in the top ten or at least giving those in the top ten a good game.

So for the whole of 1999 I didn't achieve a lot. I won a couple of satellite tournaments but it was a holding year. I kept working on it, hoping I would get a few good wins and that would boost my confidence, so I would build from there. I lost quite a lot of matches in 1999 but that didn't bother me because I was always working towards something.

How do you work on strategy - what shots to play when?
I think I have always had that in me naturally. Basically it's simple. Everybody knows how to play the game. If your opponent is at the front you want to get him to the back, there's not a lot of thinking to do. To start with I started to hit everything straight and I've been working on that ever since. That is to stop your opponent volleying. To get the ball past your opponent you have to think whether you are going to hit it high or low or hard. It keeps you thinking. We do that in training, and if I don't, Neil Harvey says 'do 20 court sprints for not thinking.' I've been doing thousands of court sprints because there are times I am so slack. He wants us to be aware of what we are doing. Why are we hitting a boast? Are we hitting a boast because we want to or because we have to. It's because we want to and that's when you start winning. It all comes from training.

When you watch ordinary club players, what is the most common error you see?
They open up the court too much and that makes them do too much running. Once you start to boast or cross court then you have given your opponent an option whether to play a drop shot or cross court and suddenly you're in trouble. I think it's even preferable to play a straight drop rather than a cross-court drop.

Do you still watch a lot of squash?
I love watching the top five guys - the top ten even. I just try to pick up something from all of them; what they play, how they move, their favorite shot. It's quit enjoyable knowing that you learning something from them. It's not all about you, you, you.

In an ideal world, how many tournaments would you like per month?
Two. And it also depends how well I do. If I play three or four matches in one tournament, then I wouldn't mind one a month and then spend the next two weeks training. But if I lose in the first round, I would like four or five tournaments a month.

Do you feel that you need a two or three month break in the year?
At some stage in the year you need two months of just training to get yourself fit and rest up mentally. If you keep on winning, you don't need to change anything. You need to lose to win sometimes.

© 2001 Squashtalk