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Hong Kong Beats The Seedings
Pools Report #3, from Vienna, Austria
By Howard Harding
October 21, 2003 All content © 2003 Squashtalk.

Hong Kong Burst Into World Championships' Last Sixteen

Hong Kong became the only unexpected nation to make the last sixteen of the Men's World Team Squash Championship after beating Bermuda in today's (Tuesday) final qualifying round in Vienna, Austria.

Hong Kong's 2/1 win over the unseeded newcomers gave the team a second place finish in Pool D, behind winners Egypt, the fourth seeds, but ahead of 13th seeds Finland whom they beat on the opening day.

Hong Kong will face 8th seeds Malaysia in an all-Asian second stage knockout clash. Malaysia ensured top place in Pool H after a 3/0 win over Italy.

Despite resting world champion David Palmer, top seeds and defending champions Australia swept to a 3/0 victory over event debutants Russia to clinch top position in Pool A, ahead of second-placed Germany, the 16th seeds. Australia next meet 12th seeds Netherlands, runners-up to Canada in Pool E but 3/0 winners today against Czech Republic.

Second seeds England also finished their qualifying campaign with maximum points after beating 15th seeds Switzerland 3/0 in Pool B. World No1 Peter Nicol finally made his long-awaited debut for England in the championships, leading his country to victory with a 9-0 9-4 9-3 win over Swiss No1 Lars Harms. England renew their long-time rivalry with Pakistan in the last sixteen after the 9th seeds finished as runners-up in Pool H.

Third seeds France established their superiority in Pool C with a 3/0 win over Slovenia and take up a place in the lower half of the last sixteen draw, where they will face 10th seeds Ireland for a place in the quarter-finals.

The full last sixteen draw is:
[1]AUSTRALIA v [12]NETHERLANDS; [8]MALAYSIA v [17/24]HONG KONG; [4]EGYPT v [11]SOUTH AFRICA; [7]WALES v [16]GERMANY; [6]SCOTLAND v [15]SWITZERLAND; [3]FRANCE v [10]IRELAND; [5]CANADA v [14]SWEDEN; [2]ENGLAND v [9]PAKISTAN

RESULTS: Men's World Team Squash Championship, Vienna, Austria

Final qualifying round:
Pool A:
[1]AUSTRALIA 3 RUSSIA 0 (Anthony Ricketts bt Alexei Severinov 9-3, 9-2, 9-0; Joseph Kneipp bt Maxim Shokin 9-3, 9-0, 9-1; Paul Price bt Andrey Bratter 9-0, 9-0, 9-0)
[16]GERMANY 3 [17/24]JAPAN 0 (Simon Frenz bt Kimihiko Sano 9-0, 9-1, 9-0; Stefan Leifels bt Takehide Nishio 9-5, 9-0, 9-0; Oliver Post bt Jun Matsumoto 9-1, 9-0, 9-5)
Final positions: 1 Australia, 2 Germany, 3 Japan, 4 Russia
Pool B:
[2]ENGLAND 3 [15]SWITZERLAND 0 (Peter Nicol bt Lars Harms 9-0, 9-4, 9-3; James Willstrop bt Marco Dätwyler 9-4, 9-0, 9-1; Nick Matthew bt Kevin Villiger 9-0, 9-2, 9-3)
[17/24]NEW ZEALAND 3 HUNGARY 0 (Glen Wilson bt Andras Torok 3-9, 9-7, 9-4, 9-2; Daniel Sharplin bt Mark Krajcsak 10-9, 9-1, 9-0; Callum O'Brien bt Sandor Fulop 9-5, 9-6, 9-7)
Final positions: 1 England, 2 Switzerland, 3 New Zealand, 4 Hungary
Pool C:
[3]FRANCE 3 SLOVENIA 0 (Gregory Gaultier bt Gasper Fecur 9-4, 9-0, 9-1; Renan Lavigne bt Damir Bezan 9-3, 9-0, 9-4; Jean-Michel Arcucci bt Klemen Gutman 9-3, 9-2, 9-5)
[14]SWEDEN 2 [17/24]AUSTRIA 1 (Christian Drakenberg bt Leopold Czaska 5-9, 9-4, 9-3, 9-0; Joakim Karlsson lost to Clemens Wallishauser 6-9, 3-9, 1-9; Badr Abdel Aziz bt Gerhard Schedlbauer 4-9, 9-3, 9-6, 10-9)
Final positions: 1 France, 2 Sweden, 3 Austria, 4 Slovenia
Pool D:
[4]EGYPT 3 [13]FINLAND 0 (Karim Darwish bt Olli Tuominen 10-9, 9-5, 9-5; Mohamed Abbas bt Hameed Ahmed 9-1, 9-4, 9-1; Wael El Hendy bt Matias Tuomi 9-0, 9-0, 9-0)
[17/24]HONG KONG 2 BERMUDA 1 (Faheem Khan lost to Nicholas Kyme 5-9, 9-1, 1-9, 0-9; Wong Wai Hang bt James Stout 9-4, 9-5, 9-4; Dick Lau bt Sam Stevens 9-1, 9-8, 9-0)
Final positions: 1 Egypt, 2 Hong Kong, 3 Finland, 4 Bermuda
Pool E:
[12]NETHERLANDS 3 [17/24]CZECH REPUBLIC 0 (Tommy Berden bt Jan Koukal 9-5, 10-8, 9-1; Lucas Buit bt Milos Pokorny 9-2, 9-1, 9-2; Dylan Bennett bt Pavel Sladecek 9-0, 9-1, 9-0)
Final positions: 1 Canada, 2 Netherlands, 3 Czech Republic
Pool F:
[6]SCOTLAND 2 [11]SOUTH AFRICA 1 (John White bt Rodney Durbach 9-4, 9-2, 7-9, 10-8; Martin Heath bt Adrian Hansen 9-1, 9-0, 9-0; Peter O'Hara lost to Craig van der Wath 1-9, 0-9, 9-3, 2-9)
[17/24]USA 3 KOREA 0 (Preston Quick bt Yong-Chun Chong 9-2, 7-9, 9-3, 9-0; Damian Walker bt Dong-Woo Kim 9-2, 9-0, 9-4; Jamie Crombie bt Seung-Jun Lee 9-1, 9-1, 9-0)
Final positions: 1 Scotland, 2 South Africa, 3 USA, 4 Korea
Pool G:
[7]WALES 3 KUWAIT 0 (David Evans bt Bader Alhosaini 9-3, 9-2, 9-1; Gavin Jones bt Nasser Alramezi 9-0, 9-0, 9-1; Greg Tippings bt Abdullah Almezayem 2-9, 9-2, 9-0, 9-4)
[10]IRELAND 2 [17/24]MEXICO 1 (Derek Ryan bt Eric Galvez 9-5, 9-7, 9-2; John Rooney bt Jorge Baltazar 9-0, 9-4, 9-0; Graeme Stewart lost to Mauricio Sanchez 7-9, 5-9, 9-7, 1-9)
Final positions: 1 Wales, 2 Ireland, 3 Mexico, 4 Kuwait
Pool H:
[8]MALAYSIA 3 [17/24]ITALY 0 (Ong Beng Hee bt Andrea Capella 9-4, 9-1, 9-6; Moh'd Azlan Iskandar bt Andrea Torricini 9-1, 9-2, 9-2; Timothy Arnold bt Giacomo Marotta 9-7, 9-0, 9-2)
Final positions: 1 Malaysia, 2 Pakistan, 3 Italy