Northern Juniors have success at home tournament
Northern Squash club had its annual junior open tournament recently and there was a bumper entry of nearly 130 boys and girls from all over the North of England. The Dunlop Newcastle Northern Junior Open sponsored by QS Lawson & Thompson is a bronze level which helps juniors accumulate points for their national rankings and some of our home juniors performed really well this season.
It was local success in the girls under 11 event where Willow Morris, from Jesmond, beat Northerns Zoe Shipsey 3 – 0 in the final, whilst the boys event was an all Yorkshire affair between Joe Royle and Akash Singh Nahal, with Joe taking a comfortable 3 – 0 victory. Yorkshire was also prominent in the under 13 events . In the boys event Yorkshire player Usman Ali defeated Northern player Sion Gittins 3 – 0 in the final and in the girls event Joe's big sister Amy Royle beat another local favourite in Katie Barker 3 – 0 in the final.
Cumbria had it's first finalist in the girls under 15 event , where Michelle Tang beat Yorkshire girl Ophelia Watson 3 – 0 in the final. The boys event saw a first success for Northern with the top seeded Andrew Shipley beating Aiden Raine from Cumbria 3 – 0 in a final that was a lot closer than the score suggests.
There was more local success in the under 17 events where Erin Vitty of Northern beat her fellow Northern member Megan Freeman in the final of the girls event and Max Forster of Jesmond had a narrow 3 – 2 win over David Collins from Cleveland. Possibly the best squash was saved until last, when Northern players took on higher ranked opponents in the finals of both the under 19 girls and boys events. First Michael Mattimore made it hard for himself by going 2 – 0 down against number 1 seed Jamie Todd of Tynemouth. He came storming back, however, to win the next three games and take the title with his first ever win over his Northumbria county team mate.
The Girls under 19 event was just as close. Local favourite Josie Barker went 2 – 1 down against higher ranked Eve Driver from Cumbria and then found herself 7 – 3 down in the fifth before showing her fighting spirit and winning 11 – 8 in the fifth.
There were many other local successes in the plate competitions : Sam Broughton (Northern), Catriona Watling (Northern), Lucy Hutchinson (Northern), Joe Wareing (Jesmond), Cameron Hamilton (Northern), Lucy Anderson (Northern), Olivia Steanson (Primrose), Tim Charteris (Jesmond), Ali Little (Jesmond), Verity Place (Consett), Callum Howie (Jesmond ), Zoe Shipsey (Northern), James Taylor (Alnwick) and Luke Radley (Hexham) were all local finalists in the plate competitions.
Northern's head coach and tournament organiser, Richard Vitty, said "this is the biggest junior tournament we've ever run here at Northern and its thanks to our sponsors QS Lawson & Thompson and Dunlop who help make it all happen. The event is also supported by Sport Newcastle, Northumbria Sport Foundation and Gosforth Academy“
