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Warm Day - Hot Squash
By Martin Bronstein
May 14, 2003 All content © 2003 Squashtalk
[last update was 16-may-03 ]

Thierry Lincou knocks Lee Beachill out of London event © 2003 Fritz Borchert for Squashtalk

Peter Nicol had won the Fleet Group with two wins so it was left to Thierry Lincou and Lee Beachill to fight for second place. And what a fight it was, between two well matched opponents with very similar games. Lincou was always that little bit tighter while Beachill was that tiny bit more dangerous with his drops from the back of the court and his backhand cross-court slams into the nick. But these were marginal differences; they could both play precise high-percentage squash without being boring – when an opportunity arose, neither of them was too scared to go for the winner. They were a good demonstration of what is required of the modern professional squash player – fitness with a good balance of defensive and attacking talents.

Lincou was still exhibiting the fine shot-weighting that held him in such good stead in New York in February, forcing Beachill to take the ball before the back wall, while Lincou always had the luxury –and time- to take Beachill’s higher shots off the back wall. Lincou was also aware of Beachill’s lack of match practise because of his ankle surgery and kept him moving back and front. If there was a criticism of Lincou’s game, it was his unwillingness to volley, always preferring to let the ball go through to the back wall. This gave him more set-up time, but it allowed Beachill to settle comfortably on the T.

After trailing 2-5 Lincou worked his way to a 11-6 lead but Beachill hit a nice streak of winners, using clip boasts and half volleys to surprise Lincou and recover to 12-10. Lincou surged to 14-11 but Beachill hit two good winners, a long backhand drop and then a short backhand chop into the nick to push the suspense to 14-13. On the next long rally, Lincou showed the value of width with a backhand cross-court which Beachill stretched for but could only touch it with the frame. After a very interesting twenty minutes Lincou won 15-13.

MORE OF THE SAME
The second game was similar in length and content, with some long patient rallies which kept the packed gallery watching intently. The lead changed hand three times but it was Beachill who got to game point first, 14-13 – and finished the game with a fluke dead nick at the back wall to win 15-13 in 22 minutes: that’s how even they were.

The third game was just eleven minutes long, which was indicative of waning energy somewhere – and that somewhere was Beachill. Trailing 5-10, he decided against chasing the game OR that as he had done most of the running, he simply did not have much gas left.

The fourth game showed that he had been saving himself. They were rarely separated by more than a couple of points and it was in this game they had some of their longest rallies, the ball tight to the wall, the cross –courts were nigh-perfect in width and the drop shots cruel in their softness. This was good stuff to watch but at the ‘breakpoint’ 10-10, it was the French champion who surged ahead and at 13-11 hit a delicious forehand volley drop right into the nick to get to match ball. The final point was dubious on a Lincou pickup before his winning forehand drop, but the referee thought all was well and after 88 minutes Lincou was through to the semis, where he will probably face Jonathon Power, the winner of the Harrow Group.

Beachill was not unhappy – indeed he said was happy to be playing at all so soon after ankle surgery. He told me before the game his recovery and been incredibly quick and he is now playing without even strapping the ankle. “It was my dream to play here and I am lucky that the recovery has gone so well, “ he said. Even though he is out of the tournament now, he may be happy that he has four full days to rest before he plays Rodney Durbach in the first round of the PSA Masters in Qatar on Monday. He should win that and then could face Alex Gough in the second round, which means he has a chance of making the quarter-finals in Qatar which will earn valuable ranking points to make up for those tournaments from which he had to withdraw because of his ankle.