SquashTalk>News >Rodney Eyles Retires from the Tour [last update was 6-nov-00 ]

Rodney Eyles Retires.

11.5.00 London from Howard Harding

EYLES RETIRES TO STAY IN THE GAME
Australia's Rodney Eyles, the longest-serving member of the Professional Squash Association, has announced his withdrawal from the PSA World Tour.

The Brisbane-born, Bermuda-based former world champion, who began his full-time career in May 1984, is to concentrate on building a new website - www.Totalsquash.com - with which he will seek to establish the most authoritative squash advice site in the world. His first business venture after 16 years on the professional circuit is to sponsor the 2000/2001 US Junior Tour through the new website. It will be known as the Totalsquash.com US Junior Tour.

A board member of the Professional Squash Association since 1995, Eyles will also continue as PSA President - leading the players' organisation through a period that he believes will see a new expansion of the game through North America and Europe.

"I am still as enthusiastic about the game as ever and I still love to play. But I have to admit, at 33, the game is starting not to love me so much. I can surf and swim, run and even box a bit for fun and without any problems. In that sense I am better off than many players who leave the game with injuries and problems. But the specific movement of squash is harder to live with. Everything on court seems to hurt a bit now."

The pugnacious PSA President will feel little pain looking back on a long and rewarding career that might have been even more star-studded but for the coincidence of timing that put him in the field at the same time as the mighty Jansher Khan and a hatful of thrusting Australians.

Born into a squash family, owners of a squash and tennis centre in the Brisbane suburb of Lutwyche, he looked destined to become world junior champion when the championships arrived in his home town in 1986, the very year that Jansher emerged from the hills of Peshawar to start his domination of the world.

Jansher beat Eyles in that junior final in Brisbane, setting off a decade of rivalry that took him to 14 PSA World Tour victories from 27 final appearances. He was one of only 14 men to defeat Jansher in tournament play between 1986 and 1998, and one of only six to manage the feat more than once. He put Jansher out of a Portuguese semi-final in 1993 and a Hong Kong Final in 1996. The peak of his achievement came late, in 1997, when he defeated Peter Nicol in the World Open Final in Kuala Lumpur, raising an astonishing level of combative performance out of a lack-lustre year that followed his best sustained period in 1996, when only a single point separated the second ranked Eyles from the world number one spot held by Jansher.

Ankle problems dogged the early professional years for Eyles and returned to demand surgery in 1990. He needed back surgery also early in 1999. "But that is the way of the professional athlete. Very few of us get through a whole career without a visit from the knife here and there," he says. He was first selected for Australian team duty in 1991, when Australia under the captaincy of Chris Dittmar and the management of Ken Hiscoe successfully defended the title by beating England 3-0 in the final in Helsinki.

Dittmar described the new boy as being 'like a dog with two tails' when told of his selection behind Dittmar himself, Brett Martin and Chris Robertson. "Without doubt the highlight of my squash life was playing for Australia. Winning the World Open was a bonus," Eyles insists. "I have enjoyed every minute of every match, though. It is almost impossible to single out one match or one event above another. I would just love to do it all again.

As it is, I reckon there aren't too many men around who have stayed the course as well as I have and I think I have learnt a great deal that can be useful to younger players. I have a lot to put back in. "I want to develop the website to become the place where young players go to find help in developing their games and furthering their careers. I want to help the PSA consolidate what they have achieved in the sport. I want to be part of the surge that is going to come for the game in North America.

"In fact I don't really plan to retire at all. I just have to phase out the actively competitive part of my career at this point and go on with the rest. I'll now be able to spend more time with my wife Michelle and my 18-month-old daughter Ashley - they mean everything to me - without sacrificing my connection to the game I love." - ENDS - Issued on behalf of: PSA For further information: Howard Harding

Issued on behalf of PSA by Howard Harding, email at howhard@aol.com.

RODNEY EYLES - THE HOT COMPETITOR

Rodney Eyles at the US Open in 1999 (Photos above and below © Vaughn Winchell)

Rodney Eyles versus Jansher Khan, New York (Photo © Debra Tessier)

Rodney Eyles in one of his combative moments (Photo © Steve Line)

Rodney Eyles versus Jansher Khan, New York (Photo © Debra Tessier)

Rodney Eyles in one of his last major PSA appearances in Boston (Photo © Vaughn Winchell )