2009 - Year of the Bagel

Well that's the end of another year of squash on the PSA World Tour. Even though our season goes through to about March-ish, it's still the end of 2009, it's the festive season, and most players like to take a quick (or long) break to re-charge the batteries and get stuck into the new year.

During the year I couldn't help but notice how many bagels were being handed out. (11-0). Once a tournament had finished I would sometimes flick through the results and see what happened. Every few tournaments someone seemed to be on the end of an embarrassing 11-0!! I came close to copping one from Darwish in the Qatar Classic. He got to 10-o in about 3 minutes but I had it all under control really. At 10-0 down I broke a string during the rally, he hit the tin, then I went on a 4 point rampage! But seriously, I couldn't believe how many bagels I saw this year. I saw one result where the player who copped the bagel, then went on to win the match! What the hell's going on there??? I've handed out a few bagel's during practise over the years but I've also been on the end of one too - in a tournament - in the final. Names will not be shared...

So, although it's been a very positive year on the PSA World Tour (apart from missing out on the Olympics, which by the way, may have been different had Tiger Woods been exposed BEFORE the inclusion of golf), I still see 2009 as the 'Year of the Bagel'.

Have a good Christmas and New Year everyone.

Cheers,
Cam

Dutch Open

I finished Runner Up in the Dutch Open to Daryl Selby, losing the final 3-1 in 104 minutes. It was a pretty tough final and Daryl managed to play the bigger points better on the day so all credit to him. I am pretty happy with the way I played throughout the event, just felt a little heavy come the final. It was a real shame to see LJ pull out of his semi with Daryl. He was looking extremely sharp in his first 2 matches and it promised to be a great semi. Hopefully the big guy will get it sorted in the next week and be right for India.

Nest event is the PSA Masters in India which starts the 5th. I'm playing local hero Sourav Ghosal first round which should be very tough indeed!

Latest

The Qatar Classic was won by Nick Matthew in a pretty impressive display against Karim Darwish. He won 3-0 and never looked like losing. I, unfortunately went down to Darwish in the 2nd round where he turned on an impressive display against me!

My next event is the Dutch Open which starts Thursday. I've had 4 days since I arrived back from Qatar and I've use it to just get back in the grove of things. A lot of ball hitting with a practice match thrown in there too. It's a matter of keeping sharp between events both physically and mentally. It's probably easier to be sharp physically to be honest. Mentally you have to keep yourself motivated which can be hard if you're not used to playing so many events back to back.

I will post my results on twitter (campilley) and at the end of the event I will post a summary on here. Good luck to me!!

Qatar Classic and 2nd round predictions!

I've started the Qatar Classic well this year with a solid 3-0 win over Chris Ryder. As expected, it's bloody hot out here but the air con brings the court back to a somewhat normal temperature. Being based in Europe a lot of the year, it's good to come to these countries sometimes to see a bit of the sun!

I played well with very few unforced errors. Next up is the No.1 seed Karim Darwish at 5pm local time. If anyone fancies watching live web streaming, go to http://www.247.tv/. There were a couple of upsets in the first round but no amazing results.

Here's mine and room mate Stewart Boswell's predictions for the 2nd round:

PILLEY BOSWELL
Pilley Pilley
Lincou Lincou
Ramy Ramy
Tarek Willstrop
Boswell Boswell
Matthew Matthew
Barker Barker
Gregory Gregory

So there you have it folks! Obviously there's no favourtism for room mates here. I've thrown in Tarek as a bit of an upset against Willstrop - big call, I know, but the little speedster is playing out of his skin lately and could move the big fella around.

World Open and current training

Word Open.
Amr Shabana. 4 World Open titles to his name. I saw him play Hindi in the Quarters and he was in absolutely stunning form. I thought, he's either peaked too early or he'll go on to win the event. It was the latter and he wrote his name into the history books with a 3-0 win over compatriot Ramy Ashour in the final.

For myself, I made the last 16 in the tournament before losing out to Nick Matthew 3-0. That's the best he's played against me for a long time and he was sharp, taking the ball in short very well. I managed a 3-0 win over Joe Lee in the first round then came back from a 2-0 deficit to beat Mohammed El Shorbagy in 5 games in the second round. I was really pleased with how I changed my game after the 2nd and then went on to dominate him in the last 3 games (3,4,3). The first 2 games were a bit scrappy. Both of us were taking it short and opening up the court for the other guy. Even though they were close (9,8) he won them both. I straightened up, gave him nothing to hit, and shut him down.

Training.
I have roughly 10 days to prepare for Qatar. It's a big event and I want to consolidate my new Top 16 ranking (15) by putting in a strong performance. It's good to be injury free again (touch wood) and I'll be going back to basics in my training in the next period of time. I'll be playing no more than 3 practice matches, instead training with my coach on structure in my play and trying to back up day after day from hard training.