French Fair Play ... WSF CEO, Canadian Open, more ... Global Gallery, June 25, 2004 Martin Bronstein, writes this month from Broadgate Arena in London. © 2004 All rights reserved. photos © 2004, Suashtalk, D. Tessier,

CANADIAN OPEN NOW CLOSED

Sad to report that the Canadian Open in Calgary has been wiped off the calendar.

This is firstly a great loss and secondly, a surprise. From all accounts last year’s event in the West Edmonton Mall was a huge success. And with $170,000 prize money, one of the three biggest tournaments on the PSA tour. But, I have been told, the money and sponsors never materialized which must be a real blow to the promoters. Normally once you have managed to get the first event staged, and that first difficult year is over, the second is a little easier, you are no longer selling something that has yet to prove itself.

So the early November spot was vacant again and John Nimick, who had moved the Canadian Classic from its usual spot in mid-November to early January 2005, has now reclaimed his spot and the Classic will now take place in the BCE Place as usual in mid-November. And I shall be there, covering it from the first round of qualification to the final for Squashtalk.

FAIRPLAY DEMANDED FROM THE FRENCH
Jacques Fontaine, a wealthy Parisian businessman, is president of the French Squash Federation. After France beat England in the European team champs, he accused some English writers, coaches and supporters of being bad losers and not keeping up to the tradition of fair play, the sort of stiff-upper-lip nurtured on the cricket fields of England. He said the same thing of me, accusing me of calling Gregory Gaultier a son of a bitch, all because England got beaten.

Well, Fontaine got it all wrong. Everything. First of all he said I had written it for Squashplayer magazine when in fact it had been on Squashtalk. Secondly I had not written those words…..I had written, admiringly that Gaultier was a tough SOB. And thirdly it had been written as a preview to the champs and that bit about Gaultier had been part of a complimentary assessment of the French chances. (It is still up on this website if you want to check it out, Jacques).

Although I had pointed all these errors out to the man, there was no apology from Fontaine, who does not believe there is a conflict of interest between his presidency and his ownership of a Paris squash club.

So much for Fontaine’s fair play. Worse to come. I wrote in Planete Squash, a French magazine published by Nicolas Barbeau, that Fontaine should stop misusing the Federation’s publications to smear my rep and settle personal debts and that he should do something useful like create a decent French Open for both PSA and WISPA and so add to the calendar. (In fact, I think that all national organisations should be made to do this as part of their responsibilities as WSF members).

Now you wanna know about Fair Play? Fontaine got so angry at Barbeau for for printing my piece that he has banned Barbeau, a qualified referee, from officiating in France. Conflict of interest? Naaah!

By the way Barbeau lived in Montreal for some years where he used to play at the MAAA and went to junior matches with John Power and his son Jonathon.

A CHRISTIAN TAKES OVER WSF
They finally announced the name of the new man to take over from Ted Wallbutton of the WSF at the end of this year. Christian Leighton, is a South American who speaks fluent Spanish and English, with a pretty good background in marketing. He sees his priority, quite rightly of marketing squash in every direction. He also said:

“….the media need to benefit from more coverage (especially on television).”

I nearly threw my laptop out the window and change my sport to Ringette.
To put it bluntly, bugger television. What the hell has television ever done for squash? Squash has turned somersaults, created a glass court, changed the scoring, done everything for that one-eyed monster and what have we got in return? Nothing. Almost zero coverage except for programs that promoters have to pay for and produce. That’s right, we hand completed tapes to the broadcasters who pay absolutely nothing.
The media who need to benefit from more coverage is the web, where Squashtalk, Squashnow and Squashplayer all provide exceptional coverage and get diddly-squat for all the hard work that goes into them.

Listen to me Christian: major squash events in unique venues are terrific experiences for the spectator. A new one is being added in England where Alan Thatcher is putting on an event on the beach at Brighton, one of England leading seaside resorts. Let the world know what a great experience it is to attend one of these events live rather than sitting in front of their television sets. Make these events so exciting and attractive that eventually the one-eyed monster comes panting along, check-book in hand, lusting to get this sport on the screen. And when they do, let them know that we don’t need them.
Don’t do it arse about face and make TV your priority, make the sporting public your main target.

Until then appreciate what the websites are accomplishing. Also take a close look and see how many journalists are actually covering the sport full-time and how much money they make. You may be surprised at your findings.

YELLOW DOT
When it comes to clothing, we squash players have had to wear tennis cast-offs. Nobody made clothing especially for squash players. Last year Jonathon Power filled the gap with his Dominator line, and now, in Britain, a name from the past has been resurrected: Yellow Dot. Back in the 80’s the Yellow Dot brand was aimed squarely at the squash player (the name says everything). But corporate buy-outs and other business shenanigans brought an end to that company.

At the PSA lunch for the press, where Gawain Briars and Jack Herrick discovered what nice, intelligent people we were, the Yellow Dot brand came back to life, firstly as a PSA partner. Soon their shirts and shorts will be available to everyone. They gave us all a shirt, which makes a change from the cheap T-shirts that journalists normally go home with (great for polishing the car). I have worn it a dozen times on the squash and court tennis courts and the quality is pretty good. Welcome back Yellow Dot…where can I buy some shorts?

ARE YOU A WEB-STREAMER?
Jack Herrick told us how important web-streaming was to the future of PSA’s plans. Web-streaming is the live transmission of matches on to your computer.

Trouble is that only 300 or so people can tune in because of the bandwidth. But, says Jack, the real benefit is for fans who can get up next morning and replay any match from not only the current tournament, but from previous tournaments.

Web-streaming has only just started and the technical bugs are still being sorted out. At this point, its almost impossible to follow the ball or any detailed view of the action!

I’m keeping my eye on it to see if it does develop as well as they hope.