Eye Group Women's World Open

The top seeded English look set fair for the semi-finals of the Eye Group Women's World Team Championship in Sheffield, England, after dismissing Malaysia from the last 16 for just nine points collectively. With Canada, the ninth seeds, unexpectedly defeating the fifth seeded Netherlands side in the adjacent slot, progress towards a semi-final against either New Zealand or South Africa seems assured.

USA FOR 17TH
In the play-offs for 17th place the USA today defeated Italy 3-0 with Ivy Pochoda beating Sonia pasteris 3-9 9-4 9-3 9-6 in 40 minutes, Shirin Kaufman beating Chiara Ferrari 9-0 9-3 9-4 in 23 minutes, and Louisa Hall beating Veronica Favero 9-2 9-1 9-0 in 27 minutes.

CANADA SURGES
Vanessa Atkinson, the top Dutch player, looked comfortable against the Canadian first string, Pan-American Champion Melanie Jans, winning 9-0 9-2 9-6 in just 24 minutes. In the Pool rounds she gave a similar bums rush to the top German, Sabine Schone. But Daphne Jelgersma never settled against Carolyne Russell, losing for seven points in less than half-an-hour, and Denise Sommers, long legged and as exotic as ever but not playing fulltime these days, just did not have the fitness to stay with World Universities Champion Marnie Baizley over four second string games.

It is hard to see the Canadians managing so well against the English, however. The top seeds allowed the Malaysians only 52 minutes on court collectively today and relinquished only nine points. Jans will indeed raise her stock appreciably if she can take a point from Linda Charman, the world number three, and neither Baizley nor Russell has the sort of pedigree to challenge Tania Bailey , Stephanie Brind or Rebecca Macree in the lower order.

Canadian team coach Ian Paton had hoped his squad would lift their ranking from nine to top five at this meet, but he had not bargained on drawing England in the quarter-finals.

SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE ROLLS
New Zealand crunched Hong Kong in just 50 minutes and South Africa did the same to Brazil in 10 minutes more. The result of their quarter-final may hinge upon a bruising third string rubber which will feature either Sarah Cook or Lara Petera, two tall and powerful Kiwis, and Sjeanne Cawdrey or Farrah Sterne, a couple of equally imposing South Africans

The French stole the day in the top half of the draw when first Isabelle Stoehr defeated Pam Nimmo, the world number 18 and Scottish first string, 9-5 9-6 9-0 and then Corinne Castets produced her best performance of the week to beat Senga Macfie from 1-2 down to clinch for the tenth seeded French a quarterfinal place in the Eye Group Women's World Team Squash Championship against the second seeded defending champions , Australia, who had earlier brushed aside the Irish.

FAST AS HASHIM
Dicky Rutnagur, the esteemed Daily Telegraph squash correspondent, claims that Stoehr, the 21-year-old world number 26 from Tours, plays remarkably like Hashim Khan. He is the only one among us who watched the old boy in his heyday. "She is quick about the court like Hashim and she gets down low to the ball so that her trajectory is very flat," he says. "She is going to be a very good player." Too good right now for the lanky Nimmo certainly, and good enough in the pool rounds to have taken the world number one, Leilani Joyce, to four games over more than an hour.

STROKE FOR SELF-ABUSE
Castets was good enough also in the last two games against Macfie as the Scottish second string descended into frantic play that earned her a conduct warning at the end of the third game for flinging her racket petulantly against the front wall, then a conduct stroke for repeatedly bashing herself about the head with the racket halfway through the fifth game. It was not clear whether the penalty was applied for racket abuse or head abuse. It was pretty awful either way and left Macfie with bruises and scrapes on both sides of her face; one alarmingly close to her left eye. Germany and Egypt came through to play the other quarter-final in the bottom half of the draw, with Manuela Zehnder, the British Junior Open Under-17 Champion, taking the point from Germany's second string, Karin Beriere, and Ellen Petersen beating the Egyptian first string Salma Shabana. .

For the latest results go to www.squashtalk.com/womensworld

Eye Group Women's World Team Squash Championship At The Hallamshire Club in Sheffield

First Round Results:
England 3 Malaysia 0
Canada 2 Netherlands 1
New Zealand 3 Hong Kong 0
South Africa 3 Brazil 0
German 2 Switzerland 1
Egypt 2 Denmark 1
France 2 Scotland
Australia 3 Ireland 0
USA 3 Italy 0
Japan 3 Wales 0

Quarter-final Lineup:
England v Canada New Zealand v South Africa Germany v Egypt France v Australia

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