LAHORE – Unseeded Moqaddas Ashraf stunned top seed Madina Zafar in thequarterfinal of the Faletti’s International Women’s Squash Championship2018, while all the top seeds breezed into the semifinals here at thePunjab Squash Complex on Monday.
Moqaddas of Pakistan proved too hot for compatriot Madina Zafar as shetamed the top seed by 3-2 in a marathon match of 51 minutes. Madina was offto flying start as she won the first game 11/7. The highly-charged secondgame saw both the players busy in playing long rallies, classic shots andmatching the speed of each other, thus leveling the score at 12/12.Moqaddas then utilized his experience and skills to tame Madina 14/12 totake the game.
Top seed Madina then put in a great performance and made a strong comebackto win the third game 11/6 and was enjoying lead in the third game, butMoqaddas bounced back in style to first level the score at 6-6 and won thenext 5 points in row to win the game 11/7. In the fifth and decisive game,Moqaddas never allowed her opponent to play freely and kept her underpressure to win the game 11/7, thus booked berth in the semifinal.
It was a luckless day for the top notch of the competition as another upsetwas also witnessed when unseeded French player Melissa Alves shocked secondseed Farah Momen of Egypt by 3-0. The French player showed outstandingsquash skills, stamina and pace to outclass the Egyptian by 11/3 in thefirst game. She continued her supremacy in the second game as well and tookit 11/4 while in the third game, the French players had faced someresistance before winning it 11/8, thus registered a convincing victory in19 minutes.
Third seed Menna Nasser of Egyptian overpowered eighth seed Riffat Khan ofPakistan by 3-0. The Egyptian had to struggle hard in only first game,which she won by 11/8 while in the second game, she only conceded threepoints and conceded just one point in the third game to win thequarterfinal in just 17 minutes and also earned place in the semifinal.
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In the fourth quarterfinal, fourth seed Farida Mohamed of Egypt outclassedAreezosadat Mousavizadeh of Iran. The Egyptian fourth seed dominated thematch right from the word it go as she took the first game 11/5, won thesecond game with utmost easy by 11/2 and took the third one by 11/5 toregister an impressive victory in 24 minutes.
On Tuesday, the first semifinal of the championship will be contestedbetween France’s Melissa Alves and Egypt’s Menna Nasser while local playerMoqaddas Ashraf will face the challenge of Egypt’s Farida Mohamed in thesecond semifinal.The men’s quarterfinals were inprogress here at the four-walled glass court installed at Faletti’sHotel.
