SquashTalk>Columns>Team Kneipp > Qatar Open > Preview Bottom Half of Draw

Two months of globe trotting squash madness begins this week with the Qatar Classic. Here’s how the bottom half of the first round pans out in our opinion.

ADRIAN GRANT versus 12* NICK MATTHEW

Nick Matthew: Had strong appearances all summer and fall  Photo © 2005 Fritz Borchert

Matthew is ranked 11, but has spent virtually all of the past 18 months between 5 and 9. Grant is currently 18, has been as high as 12. Matthew has lost one first round match this year (to El Hindi), whereas Grant has lost more first rounds than he has won (five to four). The only encounter between Grant and Matthew was 2002 which Grant won, and 2004 which Matthew won. It’s certainly won’t be headline news if Grant wins, but maybe a little surprising.

8* JAMES WILLSTROP Plays Qualifier 4

Qualifier 5 Plays 16* SHAHID ZAMAN

Qualifier 6 Plays 4* LEE BEACHILL

Qualifier 7 Plays 15* OLLI TUOMINEN

WAEL EL HINDI Versus 7* ANTHONY RICKETTS

Ricketts is Riding High.  Photo © 2005 Debra Tessier

Ricketts’ recent British Open title, added to his TOC victory earlier in the year have pushed him to a career best of 3 this month, his first time in the top 4. In theory that means easier draws, but because the seeding of this tournament was done last month, he’s seeded 7th for this tournament and is scheduled to meet a top 4 seed (Power) in the quarters. El Hindi is also at a career best and poised to break the top twenty at 21.

El Hindi has lost three first round matches this year, Ricketts has lost one. Ricketts has won three of their four PSA encounters, but the most recent one was 2003 and a lot has happened since then. El Hindi’s game hasn’t increased dramatically in this period, whereas Ricketts has gone from strength to strength, increasing his consistency, cutting down on his error rate and most importantly controlling his on court reactions so they work for him, not against him. A victory for El Hindi will be a surprise.

13* MOHD AZLAN ISKANDAR plays Qualifier 8

JOSEPH KNEIPP Versus 2* JONATHON POWER

Kneipp versus Power
Power ranking of the past few years inversely mirrors Nicol’s. Nicol was a rock of consistency in 2003 and 2004, spending most of it at 1, but his ranking is slowly sliding, now closer to 10 than 1. In 2003 and 2004 Power lost his grip on the world #2 spot and just managed to stop himself sliding out of the top 10. He’s now back at #2.

Power, the Dive Guy, Firmly reestablished at #2.  Photo © 2005 Debra Tessier

To do this Power has won 8 out of 8 first round matches this year, has progressed to at least the semis for 7 of them, and has won all three of the finals he made.

We’ve had a 12 month slide from a career high #10, to currently being #20.
Something needs to be done quickly to stop us going out of the top 20 for the first time in three and a half years, but the draws for the tournaments haven’t been exactly favourable. As soon as you go out of the top 16 you get a seeded player in the first round. Obviously you hope to play the world #16, rather than the #1, but Power in Qatar, Beachill in Hong Kong and Lincou in Saudi Arabia is reasonably unfavourable.

Team Kneipp has only won two out of seven first round matches, hence the ranking slide.

Power has won four out of our five encounters, with the one loss being years ago. He’ll go into this match as raging favourite, which should take some pressure off me and mean that I’m more likely to play better and create a possibility of an upset, but anyone who knows me knows I’ll try my darndest to negate that advantage.

THE BOSWELL FACTOR
The final crucial question to finish the preview is the unknown Boswell factor.

Lincou, Palmer, Shabana, Willstrop, Shahid Zaman, Tuominen and Iskandar all have qualifiers and will be hoping they don’t have him in the first round.
Lincou, Palmer, Willstrop and Zaman have all lost to him before, Tuominen and Iskandar haven’t played him before which probably works in Boswell’s favour, while Shabana has won the only encounter he and Boswell have had.

No one will beat Boswell in three, but Palmer, Shabana and Willstrop will enter the match as favourites. Lincou should obviously be included in that group of course, but he’s a notoriously slow starter in tournaments and won’t want that kind of challenge early on. We’d expect Zaman, Tuominen and Iskandar to make an early departure if they draw Boswell, but we’ve been wrong plenty of times before.

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