In the women’s final, World No.1 El Sherbini survived a scare from New Zealand’s No.2 seed Joelle King to record a comeback victory.
Ahead of today’s match, El Sherbini boasted a 12-1 record against King, with the Kiwi’s last win coming in the first round of the 2012 U.S. Open.
If King was intimidated by this record, she certainly didn’t show it on court. The 33-year-old came flying out, taking eight unanswered points after falling behind on the way to an 11-6 win.
While El Sherbini still didn’t look her best in the second game, there was a marked improvement on the first, and the Egyptian began to show more of her old accuracy in an 11-8 win.
With the scores level, both players went all out in an 18-minute third game. In a nail-biting finish, both players had game ball, before eventually El Sherbini took advantage to claim a 16-14 win.
King battled hard in the fourth, and drew applause from the crowd when she saved two championship balls with the scores at 10-8 to have a game ball of her own at 11-10. King, though, was unable to convert as El Sherbini fired back to take the game 13-11 and the match 3-1.
After the match, El Sherbini said: “I'm feeling really good after a tough match, Joelle played really, really good. She surprised me a little bit, I think she was playing very good squash today. I think I wasn't 100 percent focused on my game plan and then was up and down the whole match, but I'm happier now that I won.”
“I just tried to relax a bit [after losing the first game]. I tried to think of what I'm supposed to do and find my myself more I tried just to place myself and be ready for all her shots and to change it a bit in my game plan.
“Today is the only day I can celebrate and then I need to try to forget this week and focus on the next week [for the Windy City Open, which begins 23 February]. So a small celebration today and then I'll try to regroup and focus for next week.”
Result - Men’s Final: Squash On Fire Open
[1] Mohamed ElShorbagy (EGY) bt [2] Joel Makin (WAL) 3-0: 11-5, 11-9, 11-8 (69m)
Result - Women’s Final: Squash On Fire Open
[1] Nour El Sherbini (EGY) bt [2] Joelle King (NZL) 3-1: 6-11, 11-8, 16-14, 13-11 (55m)
