The Squash On Fire Open begins tomorrow with 48 men and women heading to Washington D.C. to battle it out for the PSA World Tour Bronze titles.
Round one action starts at 11:00 (GMT-5) on Wednesday February 16 and the final of the event will be held on February 20. The tournament will be shown LIVE on SQUASHTV, and will make use of our new SQUASHTV Lite production, which is a single camera setup designed to bring fans even more LIVE and on demand squash content than ever before.
‘The Beast’ Mohamed ElShorbagy makes his highly-anticipated return to PSA World Tour action this week. Having last appeared at the Qatar QTerminals Classic in October 2021, the former World No.1 is the No.1 seed for the men’s event and will face the winner of the all-British battle between Patrick Rooney and Alan Clyne in round two.
Women’s World No.1 Nour El Sherbini also makes her first appearance of 2022 this week as she aims to capture a 28th PSA Tour title. El Sherbini’s last event was a successful one for her as she picked up the CIB Squash Open Black Ball title in Cairo in December, beating Hania El Hammamy 3-1 in the final. ‘The Warrior Princess’ will open her account this week in round two against either compatriot Farida Mohamed or Hong Kong’s Liu Tsz-Ling.
Both men’s and women’s round one line-ups are filled with entertaining matches. One of the stars of the PSA Challenger Tour in 2021, 20-year-old Moustafa El Sirty, will play pre-qualifying tournament winner Tsz Fung Yip.
The pair had only met once previously on the PSA World Tour, with El Sirty beating Fung Yip 3-2 in the final of the CNS International Squash Championship in November, 2021. The winner will set up a second round match with No.8 seed Cesar Salazar from Mexico.
Home interest in the men’s draw comes from the top two USA players, Todd Harrity and Shahjahan Khan. Both on the glass court, Khan is up first, taking on England’s Nathan Lake. This will be the fourth meeting between the pair since December, with Khan yet to register a win over Lake.
Harrity will face France’s Sebastien Bonmalais in the final match of the day. The two have never met before on the PSA World Tour, and with the Frenchman starting the new year strongly, Harrity will need to be at his best to defeat the 24-year-old.
On the women’s side, the pick of the first round matches is between recent E……..