Jonathon Power Moves Back into Top Five

Feb 1, 2005 by Howard Harding © 2004
match sequence © 2004 Debra Tessier

[top Americas players]

Thierry Lincou (r) reclaims #1 and Anthony Ricketts moves up to 11 going into '05. photo © 2005 Fritz Borchert

While France's Thierry Lincou and England's Lee Beachill stay at one and two, respectively, in the new February PSA Men's World Squash Rankings, announced today (Tuesday) by the Professional Squash Association, all the remaining positions in the top ten are changed.

Canada's Jonathon Power returns to the top five for the first time in 16 months after extending his late run of form last year in January in the USA. The 30-year-old from Montreal picked up the Marsh & McLennan Apawamis Open title at the beginning of January, and went on to claim semi-final berths in the SSA Global Windy City Open and EBS Asset Management Dayton Open to climb back to No5 in the new list.

While Australia's David Palmer rises to three, England's Peter Nicol falls to four - his lowest world ranking since September 1996. The 31-year-old suffered a shock first round loss in the Windy City Open in Chicago - but then revealed the quality which saw him celebrate his 60th month as world No1 last year when he powered through the Ohio field to clinch the Dayton Open title, his 49th PSA Tour trophy since 1992.

Egypt's Amr Shabana, the most consistent player of the year to date, contested both the Chicago and Dayton finals - and is rewarded by a three-place rise to No7, behind Nick Matthew who moves up to six.

John White, who reached No1 last year but plummeted to 12 in the New Year list, ended his recent poor run with a vengeance in January when he won the Windy City Open in spectacular style. The Scot bounds back to No9 in the February list.

Notable lower order successes are achieved by Malaysia's Mohd Azlan Iskandar, who rises to a career-best 17; and Pakistan's Shahid Zaman, who makes his top 20 debut at a career-high 18.

1 [1] Thierry Lincou FRA
2 [2] Lee Beachill ENG
3 [4] David Palmer AUS
4 [3] Peter Nicol ENG
5 [6] Jonathon Power CAN
6 [7] Nick Matthew ENG
7 [10] Amr Shabana EGY
8 [5] James Willstrop ENG
9 [12] John White SCO
10 [9] Gregory Gaultier FRA
11 [11] Anthony Ricketts AUS
12 [8] Karim Darwish EGY
13 [15] Joseph Kneipp AUS
14 [13] Graham Ryding CAN
15 [14] Adrian Grant ENG
16 [17] Ong Beng Hee MAS
17 [19] Mohd Azlan Iskandar MAS
18 [21] Shahid Zaman PAK
19 [16] Mohammed Abbas EGY
20 [18] Dan Jenson AUS

[complete rankings for February]

Other Players from the Americas in the top 100 (Jan 1 2005):

30 (32) Shahier Razik CAN
58 (66) Matthew Giuffre CAN
62 (68) Eric Galvez MEX
69 (77) Rafael Alarcon BRA
79 (69) Viktor Berg CAN
70 (78) Nick Kyme BER
82 (89) Shawn DeLierre CAN
86 (92) Ian Power CAN
90 (99) David Phillips CAN
99 (103) Christoper Gordon USA

and the other top Americans:

121 (119) Beau River USA
127 (128) Dylan Patterson USA
131 (133) Preston Quick USA
135 (138) Michael Puertas
138 (142) Julian Illingworth USA

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