Challenger Events
ACE Challenger Tour 12k Day 2: Shohdy Stuns Singh, Pragasam Outlasts Tamer
Egyptian teenager Yassin Shohdy caused a huge upset in round two of the ACE Challenger Tour 12k, stunning the in-form Abhay Singh in a five-game thriller.
No.3 seed Singh came into this event having won last week’s Tuanku Muhriz Trophy title, which followed his victory at the Indian National Championships.
Those results helped move him up to a career-high ranking of No.57 in the world, almost 100 places higher than where Shohdy currently sits, at No.155.
The Cairo-based lefty, though, has won two of his last three tournaments, including the ACE Challenger 6K 2nd Leg in Malaysia earlier this summer, and beat Sri Lanka’s Ravindu Laksiri 3-0 in round one here.
There was little to split them early on, but it was Singh who took the opening game when Shohdy lifted a backhand out at 10-9 down, cutting a dispondent figure as the players left the court.
The Egyptian hit back to take game two 11-6, but dropped game three by the same 11-9 scoreline he’d lost the first, despite having at 8-5 lead.
Determined not to let that disappointment affect his game, Shohdy raced out of the blocks in game four, winning the first four points to establish a lead he would not relinquish, closing out the game with a sharp forehand winner which caught the front wall just above the tin.
He then followed suit in game five with another fast start, moving out to a 5-1 lead with a backhand drive that wrong-footed Singh.
The Indian No.2 kept fighting to close the game back to 6-5 and then 9-7, but he was unable to reel Shohdy all the way in, with the young Egyptian taking his second match ball at 10-8, letting out a huge roar in celebration.
Shohdy’s win sets up a quarter-final clash with home favourite Ameeshenraj Chandaran, who knocked out eighth seed Alasdair Prott later in the day, putting in an accomplished display to win 3-0 in just 26 minutes.
Chandaran is one of three Malaysian players left in the men’s draw, with Adeen Idrakie and Darren Pragasam also through to the last eight.
No.3 seed Idrakie had a comfortable route through round two, easing past wildcard Tay Jun Qian 3-0 in just 23 minutes, but it was a different story altogether for Pragasam.
The No.7 seed needed all five games to get past tall Egyptian Seif Tamer, edging a fourth-game tiebreak 12-10, before closing out the decider 11-7.
The scoreline only tells half the story though, particularly in game five, which featured a break in play at 6-5 to Tamer, with Pragasam receiving treatment for an ankle injury after a nasty coming together.
He returned to court to overturn the deficit and wrap up the win, though, clinching it with a forehand boast that left Tamer diving forward in vain.
There was much less drama in the women’s draw, with the top two seeds Aifa Azman and Ainaa Amani both recording 3-0 wins, beating Urwashi Joshi and Goh Zhi Xuan respectively.
Rising star Anahat Singh – playing the biggest PSA Squash Tour event of her career to date – also won 3-0, losing only 12 points in her victory over Iman Shaheen, setting up an all-Indian quarter-final clash with Akanksha Salunkhe.
The quarter-finals of the ACE Challenger Tour 12k get underway at 12pm local time on Friday, September 6th, streaming live on the SQUASHTV Live Streaming YouTube channel.
