Pakistan end 12-year drought to win World Junior Squash

KARACHI: Pakistan ended their 12-year drought to become the World Junior Champions after defeating top seed Egypt 2-1 in the final of the team championship in Poland on Wednesday.

Second seed Pakistan were up against top seed Egypt in the eight final in a row. In the first match, Israr Ahmed defeated Egypt’s top-ranked player Saadeldin Abouaish 3-0 with the score of 11-9, 11-9, 11-9 in just 39 minutes.

The win for Israr was a bit of revenge as he had been beaten 3-1 by Saad in the semi-finals of the individual category championship. But Ahsan Ayaz could not turn this lead into a win as he lost in the second match.

Youssef Ibrahim defeated Ahsan 3-1 to level the final clash. The score was 13-11, 11-13, 11-5, 11-6 in 47 minutes in favour of Youssef. This put a huge pressure on Abbas Shoukat who was to face Marwan Tarek in the decider.

And Shoukhat made it happen for Pakistan in just 37 minutes when he thrashed Marwan 11-7, 11-9, 11-8 in the decider to help Pakistan won the team championship after failing to achieve the honour for seven times in a row. Out of the seven meetings, Egypt had won, including the last three.

“This is great moment for Pakistan. We are very much happy. We congratulate our team and the whole nation on this achievement. This is truly remarkable,” said team’s coach Amjad Khan.

Amjad Khan succeeded in his assignment which was given to him by the Pakistan Squash Federation (PSF) since after the departure of Jamshed Gul and Fahim Gul.

Earlier on Tuesday, Pakistan had defeated the USA 2-0 in the semi-finals. Abbas Shoukhat beat Samuel Scherl 10-12, 11-4, 11-4, 11-5 in 40 minutes in the first match and Israr Ahmed thrashed Andrew Douglas 11-9, 11-9, 11-9 in just 28 minutes.

It should be noted that the last time Pakistan won the World Junior Team Championship was in 2008. That team included Amir Atlas Khan, who was ranked 24th in the world at that time. 

In 2014, Pakistan had only one player who was ranked among the top 100 — Tayyab Aslam, ranked 95th. Pakistan were the runners-up in 2014.

The teams that participated in the World Junior Team Championships in 2010 and 2012 had no player among the world top 100.

The team selected for this year’s WJ edition too had low-ranked players: Ahsan Ayaz (241st), Israr Ahmed (132nd), Abbas Shoukat (235th), Mehran Javed (no ranking) and Kashif Asif (230th).

In the 2012 edition, Pakistan had Nasir Iqbal (127th), Ali Bukhari (217th), and Hamza Bukhari (170th). In 2010, the Pakistani team had Nasir Iqbal (212th), Danish Atlas (133rd), and Farhan Zaman (266th). Pakistan stood runners-up in both 2012 and 2010 editions.

Pakistan’s lowest position in the World Juniors (team championship) was 9th that they achieved in Hong Kong in 1992.