(updated 20-may-10 21:49 ) 

Shahier Out-Plays Weary Arnold in Straight-Set Final
In a display of court coverage and consistency the extent of which drew head-shaking admiration from the crowd and far too many errors from his understandably frustrated opponent, top seed Shahier Razik, a current PSA No. 25 who has been as high as No. 20 in the world rankings, convincingly defeated second seed Scott Arnold 11-3, 6 and 6 on a sunny afternoon in mid-town Manhattan in the final round of the 42nd annual Quentin Hyder Invitational, the longest continually running international-ball tournament in the United States. Razik thereby decisively completed his three-match, nine-game path through the draw in winning this event for the third time (previously 2003 and 2006) after recent-years runner-up finishes in 2007 (11-9 in the fifth against Wael El-Hindi) and last year, when he was out-gunned by multiple-time World Open and British Open champion David Palmer.

Certainly no one was going to emulate Palmer this past weekend against Razik, who in each of his sequential 3-0 victories over Gareth Webber, Bradley Ball and now Arnold was able to construct a defensive brick wall against which his opponents wound up fruitlessly pounding their heads. The Egyptian-born Toronto resident seems to flow effortlessly to everything that is hit, and even his “defensive” returns are usually high and deep enough to deny his opponent a forceful follow-up shot. Razik rarely is wrong-footed and even more rarely (fewer than a handful of times in this match) commits unforced errors, and his style against all but the very best (like Palmer a year ago in this same Sports Club/LA venue) inexorably sows impatience, mental exhaustion and consequent waves of miscues from his opponents, usually in the middle or late portions of games, by which time Razik’s cumulative pressure frequently takes its toll.

This unhappy phenomenon definitely befell Arnold, the tall Australian PSA No. 60 currently based in Rye, who in fairness had weathered a series of strenuous pre-final challenges, first in his Friday-evening quarterfinal with ISDA doubles superstar Clive Leach (who led two games to love and had a match-ball at 10-9 in the fourth before losing that game 12-10 and the fifth 11-5) and then in a Saturday-afternoon semi against Yasser El-Halaby, who at a game apiece led late in the third game before suffering an Achilles-tendon tear that will require surgery (sometime this coming week) and a long period of rehabilitation.

Fatigued mentally as much as physically by those prior contests, Arnold contributed a half-dozen either semi-forced or unforced tins to Razik’s point total in the 11-3 first game, then saw a promising 3-0 start to the second dissolve in a trio of tins that launched a Razik spurt to 9-4. It wasn’t until the third game that Arnold seemed to have finally girded himself for the tortuous-point exchanges that are necessary for anyone hoping to impose their game on Razik, and Arnold’s newfound resolve resulted in the most competitive dozen-point sequence of the match. But at the end of that time and after all that work and persistence had led to a score of no better than 6-all, Arnold proved unable to sustain that level, ending two consecutive lengthy exchanges with tins (making the score 8-6, Razik), following which Razik guided a backhand drop-shot into the front-left nick for a clear winner and a 9-6 advantage.

Fittingly, the final two points were both decided on front-court parries concluding with Arnold drop-shot attempts that caught the very top of the tin. Razik lacks the thunderbolts and flash that are normally associated with top-tier players, which does not, however, make his game any less lethal. In this championship, his under-stated arsenal was far more than anyone in the talented 24-player field could handle, and he emerged unscathed and in possession (as noted for the third time in the past eight years, a total that exceeds anyone else’s during that span) of the Hyder permanent trophy presented by the great man himself, now several months into his ninth decade and still as energetic, animated and beloved as when, almost as a lark, he first began this tourney on narrow courts at the New York Athletic Club more than 40 years ago.

From that modest beginning, the tournament has grown to the point where over the course of this past weekend, there were a total of 163 players competing across 14 competitive categories, from many regions of the country, including Boston, Pittsburgh, California, Chicago, Washington DC and Philadelphia. The Metropolitan Squash Racquets Association has taken responsibility for organizing and running the event throughout the 2000’s, and its leaders, including Executive Director Kenny Scher and Board members Corey Modeste and Jessica Green, joined forces with Eddie Kapur, the head pro of the host club, to produce a genuine squash happening from both a participatory and spectator perspective.

Finals Recap: Shahier Razik d Scott Arnold, 11-3, 6 and 6.
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Rob Dinerman is the author of the newly-released "Chasing The Lion: An Unresolved Journey Through The Phillips Exeter Academy". Excerpts and more information can be found at www.RobDinerman.com.