The Jonah Barrington Column: January 2024

One of the sport’s greatest thinkers and a pioneer for the professional game, Jonah Barrington offers his thoughts on all of squash’s biggest talking points in his monthly column – written exclusively for the PSA World Tour website.

In this month’s column, Jonah discusses the British Junior Open and looks ahead to the J.P. Morgan Tournament of Champions, taking place this week inside New York’s Grand Central Terminal.

By Jonah Barrington

The most prestigious British Junior Open has confirmed what we already know, that Egypt not only dominates the professional game but has a wealth of boys and girls on the march and an almost irresistible force, as they swept away with the 10 titles on offer.

This can be exceptionally discouraging for youngsters from other countries, doomed at present to be playing the mainly bit parts.

It does look very daunting and all credit to the Egyptian Federation coaches and parents that their junior level is so advanced.

Amina Orfi is already challenging the leading professionals and many have already speculated that she may be the long term favourite for gold at the LA28 Olympic Games.

Since the turn of the century, the Egyptians have been increasingly battle-hardened by constant internal competition from a very early age and, through their proven system, continue to forge onwards and upwards.

Yet the other historical squash countries have struggled to sell the sport to their young communities, and at junior level have slipped further and further behind.

Pakistan and Australia have, for very different reasons, almost slipped off the scene, but the former nation with the current World Junior Champion (Hamza Khan) shows signs of a revival.

A country with the two greatest male players of all time (Jahangir Khan and Jansher Khan) and a veritable host of magnificent world class players – remember Hashim (Khan), Azam (Khan), Roshan (Khan) and Mohibullah (Khan) were there before even them – surely has to sit at the top table once again.

With a cultural advance for female players in our sport as well.

The latter country had a bank of wonderful men and women up to the turn of the century, yet the governing body did not have the wherewithal to have squash selected for the Sydney Olympics – that to me was a scandal.

The Egyptians have then been in overdrive for years and we had the considerable privilege of having the teenage ElShorbagy brothers at Millfield School, and the boys were extremely motivated, streetwise, and ready in all ways at a total level above their potential English counterparts and indeed the rest of the world.

But I am not preaching doom and gloom and will explain why. At present, no other countries have the numbers and perhaps never will. But I will however bore the odd reader by journeying back to the late 70s and 80s when a remarkable maverick and obsessive squash fanatic, sadly the late Edward Poore, approached me to discuss the possibility of engaging juniors at a much younger age.

He travelled around, created a group of boys (there were a couple of girls as well and that’s another story of bureaucratic contention) and I then worked with squads at under-10s and under-12s.

Edward worked out a much more competitive tournament system, and despite the inevitable and objections from some so-called traditionalists, the best juniors emerged.

Del Harris, Peter Marshall, Simon Parke, Chris Walker and a host of top line future pros.

At that time the only real rivals on court did come from Australia and Pakistan. I would suspect that the latter would implement a new radical junior system, to engage the youth in similar numbers, the girls too, but I’m not holding my breath there (yet).

And Australia now has to get off its backside to ensure that our game has a central placing in Brisbane 2032.

There is now less time to lose, and I will repeat the mantra in every article.

John Nimick was the USA National Hardball Champion in 1982. He then turned professional and was a leading player on the hardball tour.

He was instrumental with others in linking the sometimes painful journey of US hardball squash to the primary global game of softball.

I have always loved the remarkable history of my beloved sport and I can assure you that the current professionals, many of whom are probably not that interested in the past, understandably so I may say, owe a very considerable debt to John.

As the tour once again hits New York and Grand Central this week, the iconic Tournament of Champions (ToC) represents a remarkable reminder of the special influence of one man sitting down and maintaining possibly the ultimate testimony of the switch in North America from hardball (a terrific game by the way) to softball.

ToC has stood the test of time and may well have been the early catalyst in part responsible for the ultimate arrival of squash in the Olympics in 2028 at LA.

There will inevitably come the day when John Nimick will not be at the helm of this amazing event (please don’t forget his other tournaments either). Yet his crucial contribution to the growth of the game must never become a mere historical footnote.

That leaves me to report that entering my strange mind many moons ago, as squash started to fade in the old British colonies (yes it did), I realised that the USA was rapidly providing so many more opportunities for competition at amateur level (even within the college system) and then the myriad of relatively small pro tournaments were coming on line.

Thus, you come back yet again to John Nimick and the ToC and the part it has played on that wretchedly frustrating journey to the Olympics.

Whereas Egypt will patently have the playing strength for the foreseeable future, and huge acknowledgement must be given to CIB principally and others there who somehow kept the flag flying during that appalling pandemic, it is manifest to me that the USA is increasingly the centre of our sport, financially and otherwise.

We should be grateful, yet determined, to get our act together right across the planet. We are now in 2024 and anxiously waiting for news that governing bodies in all the continents are utilising the publicity opportunity of a lifetime.

Whether I like it (and I don’t) the exit is getting closer, but please don’t remain on your marks forever.

Happy New Year! 

Jonah