What’s the story?
Rising Indian squash star Velavan Senthilkumar created history by winning the first-ever all-Indian Boys’ Under-19 final at the British Junior Open in Sheffield on Friday. The 5/8th seed defeated his unseeded compatriot Abhay Singh, 15-13, 11-2, 10-12, 11-7 in 59 minutes.
India also secured the bronze medal in this category after 9/16th seeded Adhitya Raghavan finished third. Raghavan came back from two games down to upset the second seed Youssef Ibrahim of Egypt, 6-11, 6-11, 11-7, 11-7, 11-7 in 33 minutes in the bronze medal play-off.
In the 91-year history of this event, considered the world’s second most prestigious junior tournament after the World Championships, this was the first time two Indians faced off in a summit clash.
An elated national coach Cyrus Poncha commented, “This is the biggest thing that has happened to Indian Squash at the junior level! The British Open is the ‘Wimbledon’ of Squash and in this 2017 edition, India had 3 players finishing 1st, 2nd & 3rd in the boys under 19 category.
“It was in the 1970s that Anil Nair won this event first for India and in more recent times our current National Champion Saurav Ghosal did it in 2004.”
In case you didn’t know…
Senthilkumar has long been touted as one of the best talents from the next generation. The southpaw bagged the U-19 Asian Junior Individual Squash Championship last September.
Subsequently, he became the first Indian since Saurav Ghosal in 2004 and the third Indian overall to triumph in the B19 category of the British Junior Open. Besides the B19, India has also had a host of other champions in different sections. Mahesh Mangaonkar, Joshna Chinappa and Dipika Pallikal have each been a former winner.
This is also the third consecutive year that Indian squash players have captured a medal at this elite junior event. In 2016, Neel Joshi grabbed the bronze medal in B13 while the year before that, Kush Kumar brought home the B19 bronze.
The heart of the matter
All the three medal winners are trainees at Chennai’s Indian Squash Academy which has been instrumental in churning out talent on a consistent basis. Between the two finalists, Abhay Singh’s run at this tournament was more stunning as he was unseeded and had accounted for three seeds en route to the final.
However, he fell short against the 5/8th seeded Senthilkumar in the end even though he did put up a great fight.
The 18-year-old Senthilkumar was up 10-5 in the first game but had to stave off a late surge from Abhay to eke out the opener, 15-13. Abhay came storming back in the third game after saving a match ball to take it 12-10 only to see the Asian junior champion close out the victory in the fourth game.
Sportskeeda’s Take
Indian squash has been on the rise for the past few years. Success at the Commonwealth Games and the Asian Games has proved it. At the junior level too, India has been making giant strides with Kush Kumar winning the 2014 World Championships bronze and Senthilkumar grabbing the Asian Championships gold last year.
There is no doubt that this latest accomplishment is a shot in the arm and will boost the sport even further in the country.
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