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The
2003 US Open
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Open
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Lee Beachill Hoists US
Open Trophy
By Ron Beck
©
2004 Squashtalk, all rights of reproduction reserved.
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Severe
Referee's Call Puts End to Comeback
Sept 21 2004, Symphony Hall, Boston
MA
LEE
BEACHILL SHARP ENOUGH TO EARN #1
Today #2 Lee Beachill showed the Symphony Hall audience of 850 how to
defeat world #1 Peter Nicol. And with the win he will take over from Nicol
the number one position on October 1st. Considering the importance of
the occasion, it was regrettable that an determined comeback attempt by
Nicol in the third game ended on a debated and debatable referees decision
which left the hall in dead silence and both players confused.
But Beachill was clearly the better player on a tuesday night in Boston, with the squash good but not inspired, save for a scintillating stretch midway through the second game when Beachill, who knew the Nicol onslaught would come, let the points extend on and on calmly letting Nicol exhaust himself.
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| Cool Lee Beachill had Nicol on the run all evening. (photo © 2004 Stephen Line) |
"It still hasn't hit home that I'm #1," said Beachill to SquashTalk. "I'll let it wait until October 1st when the rankings come out, when it's real."
In the past 12 months, Nicol has beaten Beachill three times and lost twice. The last time that they met, Beachill won, which was at the British Nationals in February 2004. They hadn't met since then.
So Lee Beachill knows Peter Nicol's game, and executed a game plan that worked to perfection.
What Beachill did quite effectively, was to take pace off the ball. Peter Nicol thrives off of a fast-paced game, in which he can dictate the flow of play and couterpunch any loose hard-hit balls for dangerous counterattacks. But faced with measured drives that lost speed rapidly as they reached Nicol's backhand corner, Peter was hamstrung.
NICOL
FINDS THE TIN
And Nicol's bugaboo was the tin. In the first and second rounds in Boston,
Nicol had been finding the tin on his backhand drop with alarming regularity.
It hadn't been noticed, however, because he worked around that weakness
to easily advance in the tourney. Then in yesterday's
semifinal, it seemed that his beeline for the tin had been banished.
He played almost error-free squash in the semis. But here he was in the
final, finding the tin again.
Peter Nicol, who appeared wary of Beachil from the start, began with a 5-0 deficit and struggled the entire match to pull even. In the first game, Nicol fought back out of the hole with a series of volleys, volley drops, and risky attacking boasts. He eventually hit enough crucial tins that his frantic comeback attempt fell short 11-8.
In the second game, Nicol dug in and matched Beachill point-for-point. at 6-6 Peter Nicol executed a sudden cross-court kill shot that seemed to signal that he would even the match up. But Beachill simply upped his game, while still keeping to his plan to drive Nicol back with measured medium speed drives. The next point went on for almost eighty exchanges, until Beachill evened it at 8-8. The next was 48 exchanges, ending in a let. Lee Beachill was going to let Peter wear himself out on these brutal defensive points. The next was 57 exchanges, with Beachill taking a 9-8 lead. After Nicol evened it up at 9-9; he found the tin again. Two unforced tins gave Beachill the second game.
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| Symphony Hall (photo © 2004 Stephen Line) |
In the third Beachill built an 8-1 lead and the match seemed ready to conclude. But Nicol had more to give. Changing to an all out attacking game, Nicol reeled of a series of winning points, and suddenly the score stood at 7-8.
When Peter got a forehand volley drop to even the score at 9-9 the tension was building in the hall. The crowd, in fact the players, were preparing for a long match.
Then, after a long series of exchanges, Peter Nicol slipped in the center of the court, and as he desperately tried to take the ball off the back wall from a kneeling position, Nicol shot the ball high out of bounds out of the court, straight into the massive pipe organ on the wall of Symphony Hall. The ball couldn't be retrieved.
So at match ball, 10-9 in the third game, a new ball had to be warmed up. With the ball warmed up, Nicol attacked at once, going for two drop shots in succession, which Beachill defended successfully. The point ended in a let.
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| Peter Nicol's desperation stretch at 9-9 in the third put the ball high into the Symphony Hall's organ. (photo © 2004 Stephen Line) |
And then on the next point, on an extremely marginal call, the referee awarded stroke, game and match to Beachill. The players didn't know what had happened - neither one was expecting a stroke. And the referee himself probably wished he could take the call back. But a stroke had been called, the match was over, and the energy and tension which had been building in the Hall was snuffed out by that simple referee's call. And in any event, in all probability, Beachill was going to collect the win.
As Peter Nicol pointed out post-match, "Lee deserved the win. He was too good in the first and second games. I did manage to get in there in the third, and did feel a little burned by that last call."
So there's a new US Open Champion and a new #1. Next the tour moves on to San Francisco, St Louis and Detroit. Though the new world #s 1 and 2 will not appear at any of those venues.
The victory brings Beachill's career PSA Tour title haul to seven since winning his first trophy in Canada six years ago. The triumph also comes at the end of a remarkably consistent nine-month run in which he has appeared in four PSA finals - winning them all, against the seeding!
Both Beachill
and Nicol will now be turning their attention on the 2004 British Open,
which gets underway at the end of next month in Nottingham. The two are
certain to be seeded to meet in the final, but for the first time ever
it will be Nicol who will be assuming the role of 'underdog'.
FITZ-GERALD
STILL THE BEST
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| Sarah FitzGerald edged Natalie Grainger in the preliminary. (photo © 2004 Stephen Line) |
For those fans who showed up early tonight at Symphony Hall, John Nimick had arranged a special exhibition between retired WISPA star Sarah Fitz-Gerald and current world #4 player Natalie Grainger.
This was a serious exhibition - neither woman wanted to lose. Playing the same PAR-to-eleven scoring in use at the US Open, Fitz-Gerald eked out a narrow win in both games they played, showin some slight rustiness on the touch shots but terrific movement, pace and length.
US Open
Squash 2004
F inals, Sunday at Symphony Hall: [complete draw]
Lee Beachill
(ENG, 2) def Peter Nicol (ENG)(1) 11-8 11-9 11-9
Women's Exhibition:
Sarah Fitz-Gerald (AUS) def Natalie Grainger (USA) 11-10(2-0) 11-9
