Cannon Kirk Gillen Markets Irish Squash Open SFs: Bryant and Zakaria Set Up Mouthwatering Final

Jonah Bryant and Mohamad Zakaria will meet in a mouthwatering rematch of this year’s British Junior Open final, this time with the Cannon Kirk Gillen Markets Irish Squash Open title on the line. 

Bryant and Zakaria are widely regarded as two of the best – if not the two best – prospects in the men’s game, and showed exactly why with impressive semi-final wins in Dublin. 

18-year-old Bryant was taking on fellow Englishman Declan James in a matchup of arguably the two most in-form players on the Challenger Tour. 

Both had won their two most recent Challenger Tour events, but it was Bryant who made the better start, flying out to a 6-1 lead with some outstanding squash in the opening rallies. 

James was never in the game from that point, but he turned things around in game two, taking it 11-7 to draw back on level terms. 

Bryant, though, continued to show maturity beyond his years, winning game three on a stroke, and then quickly establishing an 8-1 lead in the fourth. 

A phenomenal rally – lasting more than two minutes – got the ending it deserved as Bryant feathered a beautiful forehand drop into the nick to halt James’ charge at 8-4, but the more experienced Brit was not done yet. 

He rallied back from 9-4 down to 10-8, heaping the pressure on Bryant’s shoulders. 

Ultiamtely, though, his comeback would fall short, with a stroke decision down the backhand side handing the teenager victory. 

“I’m very happy,” Bryant said after his win. 

“Obviously Dec’s been in really good form recently. He beat Gawad at the London Classic and he’s won his last two Challenger Tour events so I knew it was going to be a really tough game today. 

“I thought I set my stall out really well in the first game. My length and width was close to immaculate, I made a couple of errors but I was applying lots of pressure. 

“In the second, he started to find his length a bit better than me and he was in front of me, volleying. You’re not going to beat Dec if he’s in front of you volleying, because he’s got such a big wingspan and he’s so good across the middle. 

“So in the third and fourth, I managed to get him in behind me, kept moving him around the court and felt like I constantly had him under pressure. 

“I think I was 8-1 up in the fourth and he started slowly creeping back to 10-8, and I was thinking… ‘come on mate, this would be the biggest bottle of the century’, so I was happy to close it out.” 

Bryant will now get his shot at revenge for defeat to 16-year-old Zakaria in January’s BJO final, after the Egyptian came through a five-game battle with No.2 seed George Parker.

After dropping the first game, Zakaria took games two and three, only for Parker to cruise through the fourth, winning it 11-3. 

The Egyptian was perhaps the fresher of the two, though, and that appeared to pay dividends in the decider, as he closed it out 11-4 to reach his first 20k final. 

The women’s final will pit the top two seeds head-to-head, after both Nada Abbas and Emily Whitlock beat English opponents 3-0. 

Egypt’s Abbas knocked out Kiera Marshall in the day’s first match, needing only 29 minutes to record a relatively comfortable win, while Whitlock beat Asia Harris in little more than half an hour, clinching victory when a Harris forehand found the tin. 

Whitlock will now look to go one better than in 2022, when she was runner-up here to Tinne Gilis, albeit on a different court to the green show court where tomorrow’s final will be played. 

“It was hot, it was fast, I’m sweaty,” she said after beating Harris. “It wasn’t pretty all of the time, but I did alright.” 

Speaking on the fast nature of the court, and how that affects her game, she added: “I like to use height, it’s just a variation to pace. I don’t see it as a weakness, I don’t see it as copping out of being physical, and playing at a fast pace. 

“I just like to use the front wall, but you can’t really [here], because if someone’s smacking the ball at you and it flies through the middle, lifting can often be a push in the end, and it’s passive, but I think I just got the balance right in the end today.” 

The Cannon Kirk Gillen Markets Irish Squash Open finals kick off at 3:30pm local time on Saturday, April 27, streaming live on the SQUASHTV Live Streaming YouTube channel 

Results: Women’s Semi-Finals 
 [1] Nada Abbas (EGY) bt Kiera Marshall (ENG) 3-0: 11-6, 11-4, 11-1 (29m) 
[2] Emily Whitlock (WAL) bt [5] Asia Harris (ENG) 3-0: 11-5, 11-8, 11-6 (31m) 

Results: Men’s Semi-Finals 

Jonah Bryant (ENG) bt Declan James (ENG) 3-1: 11-6, 7-11, 11-6, 11-8 (64m) 
Mohamad Zakaria (EGY) bt [2] George Parker (ENG) 3-2: 7-11, 11-8, 11-7, 3-11, 11-4 (74m)