ISLAMABAD: Thirteen local players went through to the second qualifying round of the Pakistan Open Mens’ Squash Championship on the first day of the competition on Sunday here at the Mushaf Squash Complex.

Danish Atlas Khan, Ali Mujtaba Bukhari, Kashif Asif, Waqar Mehboob, Faraz Muhammad Khan, Raees Khan, Shahjahan Khan, Waqas Mehboob, Shoaib Hassan, Zeeshan Khan, Asim Khan, Sadam-ul-Haq and Bilal Zakir moved into the next qualification round.

Raees was the only player out of these who defeated a foreigner to go through. He beat Curtis Malik of England.

Whereas, Sean Conory from Ireland defeated Mehran Javed of Pakistan while Rui Soares from Portugal outclassed local boy Iqtidar Khan and Adeen Idrakie from Malaysia won his match against Hair Qasim.

Egypt’s M. Elshorbagy, who is world number 5, is a top seed in the competition followed by compatriots M. Abouelghar, ranked world number 11 and Z. Mohamed ranked world number 24.

In the Chief of Air Staff Women’s Champ­ionship no Pakistani player could win in the qualification round on the opening day.

France’s Enora Villard took only 23 minutes to defeat Pakistan’s Noor-ul-Huda (11/1,11/5,11/3) while Farha Momen of Egypt outclassed local player Faiza Zafar.

Switzerland’s Nadia Pfister from took only 18 minutes to outclass Madian Zafar from Pakistan while Naouran El-Torky from Egypt defeated Zahab Kamal Khan in straight games.

Torky’s compatriot Hana Moataz, Arezoosadat Mousavizadeh from Ireland, Scahika Ingale from India and Hana Ramadan from Egypt also won their matches.

Published in Dawn, December 18th, 2017