The end of the junior squash season saw the Dunlop challenge series finish at Jesmond squash club recently. This popular series of nine tournaments runs once a month at Newcastle`s main three squash clubs – Jesmond , Northern and Tynemouth.
The idea of these small scale events is to help younger players get into tournament play and this season has been a great success with nearly 200 Newcastle junior squash players taking part. Nearly half of the 140 juniors that ended the season on the ranking list are from Northern`s junior section.
Each time a junior competes in one of these tournaments they get bonus points, depending on where they finish and then the highest points totals win prizes at the end of the season , provided by Dunlop.
The end of season finale at Jesmond was a very tense affair with the prize winners in doubt until the very last games. Max Forster ( Jesmond ), Lennox Lockwood ( Tynemouth ) and Nick McIntyre ( Tynemouth ) were the top three points winners and won Dunlop rackets. Nathan Dobson ( Tynemouth ), Ollie Forster ( Jesmond ) and Charlie Lockwood ( Tynemouth ) finished in the next three places and won Dunlop squash bags. The final six prize winners were Sam Evans ( Primrose ), Callum Howie ( Jesmond ), James Appleby ( Northern ), Kyle Black ( Eldon Square ), Ben Evans ( Primrose ) and Megan Evans ( Northern ).
General Manager at Jesmond squash club and one of the tournament organizers , Jim Douglas , said “ To see junior squash players as young as seven playing in these events is very encouraging, the sponsorship by Dunlop is helping to get kids in Newcastle out from in front of their TVs and playing competitive sport”.
