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The 2000 TOC Event

Site updated on 02/01/2001

The CSFBdirect Tournament of Champions 2001,
presented by NYSC Feb 3 - Feb 9 2001,
Grand Central Terminal, New York

TOURNAMENT OF CHAMPIONS 2001
Martin Bronstein reporting from the New York Athletic club Friday Feb 1 2000.

EARLY CASUALTIES.
Ahmed Barada was the first casualty of this first major tournament of 2001, calling in sick the day before qualifying began. The second casualty was the new Flying Finn, Olli Tuominen, who didn't quite fly fast enough in New York traffic and arrived four minutes after John Nimick started the 32 man draw for the qualifying rounds. So poor old Olli was out allowing in the world number 247 ranked player Eric Christiansen, another American-based hopeful, in.

The third near casualty was Stefan Casteleyn, the first Belgian ever to reach the top ten in squash a couple of years back. Now he spends half the year in California and the other half in Belgium. It hasn't done his squash a whole heap of good and now he's down to 34 in the world and trying to get back up again.

LOST BAGGAGE AND ALMOST A LOST MATCH.
He landed in New York from LA but somehow his baggage just kept travellin' and so poor Stefan was without any kit at all. He was playing the David McNeely, once the great white hope of American squash, and a player he should have put away inside 25 minutes but after winning the first game Casteleyn started complaining about his new shoes - brand new of course - and suddenly McNeely was 2/1 up and thinking it was Christmas. But according to Neil Harvey McNeeley didn't push it hard enough.

"In my day if I had a hint of a weakness in my opponent, I'd be treading on his feet," he joked. Casteleyn recovered to win in five, and will now play England's Adrian Grant who beat American Eric Christiansen, the lucky man who got in the draw in Olli's place.

HARVEY'S WORDS OF PRAISE
Tim Wyant is ranked 280 in the world but has been working in England to improve his game. He went down in three to the brilliant Amr Shabana of Egypt, but according to Harvey for 25 minutes it was quality squash. "Tim is working hard and is intelligent and in a few years he will be America's top player," Harvey said after congratulating Wyant on his performance.

NOT A VINTAGE YEAR
Compared to last year when people like Joe Kneipp and David Palmer were in the qualifying and where we saw some mammoth battles, this year has been fairly tame, with first round qualifying matches being mostly walkthroughs. One exception was the 90 minute meeting of Ahmed Faizy and Eric MacAlpine.

Faizy was the 1996 world junior champion but has simply never matured into a senior player. After nearly six years he is still ranked outside the top 50. He is one of the few Egyptian players born without the ability to hit winners from the cradle and while MacAlpine is no Rodney Martin he knows when to go for the nick.. Faizy took the first game but MacAlpine, ranked 99, soon sorted out the weaknesses and took the next game 15-10 and led 11-9. But a couple of bad rallies allowed Faizy back in to take the game 15-11 and the fourth 15-8. It was no walkover - the rallies were long and lungbusting, but MacAlpine took the loss happily saying that he had not trained since Christmas due to a bad cold.

QUALIFYING TOURNAMENT FEBRUARY 1 AND 2
(Figs in brackets indicate world rankings at Jan 1 2001)
Amr Shabana (26) (Egypt) beat Tim Wyant (280)(US) l15-9, 15-9, 15-10.
Chris Walker (40) (England) bt Jason Jewell (83) (US) 3/0
Adrian Grant (49) (England) bt Eric Christiansen (247) (US) 15-5, 15-4, 15-5.
Stefan Casteleyn (34)(Belgium) bt David McNeely (153) (US) 3/2 Stephen Meads (30) (England) beat Preston Quick (160) (US) 15-7, 15-5, 15-8.
Kareem Darwish (42) (Egypt) beat Richard Chin (US) 15-7, 15-8, 15-11.
Shahier Razik (41) (Canada) beat Friday Odeh (152) (Nigeria) 15-12, 15-5, 15-7.
Lee Beachill (28) (England) beat Jago Nardelli (95) (England) 15-4, 15-8, 15-1.
Rodney Durbach (29) (RSA) beat Zarak J. Khan (76) (Pakistan) 15-4, 15-5, 15-4.
Matt Jenson (67) (Aus) beat Segun Maku (102) (US) 15-14, 15-2, 15-9.
Ahmed Faizy (57) (Egypt) beat Eric MacAlpine (99) (England). 15-9, 10-15, 15-ll, 15-8
Anthony Ricketts (33) (Aus) bt Beau River (US) 15-3, 15-6, 15-5.
Tim Garner (39) (England) bt Mark Lewis (138) (US) 15-6, 15-6, 15-3
Davide Bianchetti (43) (Italy) beat Karim Yehia (184) (Egypt) 15-7, 15-8, 15-13
Mikkel Korsbierg (70) (Denmark) beat Jeffrey Osborne (150) (Aus) 15-5, 15-5, 15-2.
Mark Cairns (27) (England) beat Steven Polli (235) (US) 15-9, 15-0, 15-8