Egypt retain girls' crown

Tennis: Foreign round-up

Second-seeded India overcame the US 2-1 to finish third here on Saturday, their best-ever performance in the girls team event at the World junior squash championship, while Egypt retained the title with a commanding 2-0 win over Hong Kong-China in the final.

Top seed Egypt had few problems against sixth-seeded Hong Kong, the surprise finalists, who seemed to have run out of steam after their stirring show against India on Friday.

Egypt were off to a flier when Heba El Torky took the opening singles easily despite dropping the second game. They then sealed the issue when 13-year old world champion Nour El Sherbini chalked up a fluent 3-0 win over Tsz Wing Tong and the inconsequential third singles was not played.  

The third place finish bettered the fourth in 2003 when India lost to England in the play-offs in Cairo, but it was touch-and-go for the Indians against fifth seeded US, who nearly pulled off a coup. India’s top junior Dipika Pallikal expectedly won her first singles against Oliva Blatchford, but Surbhi Misra went down to Amanda Sobhy in the next match to tie the score at 1-1.

In the deciding third singles, Anaka Alankamony began shakily against Julie Cerullo by losing the first game before recovering to win the next two for a 2-1 advantage. Cerullo fought back splendidly to take the fourth game to push the match into the decider.

Results: Final: 1-Egypt beat 6-Hong Kong China 2-0 (Heba El Torky beat Tsz Ling Liu 11-6, 2-11, 11-5, 11-6; Nour El Sherbini beat Tsz Wing Tong 11-8, 11-6, 11-6; third singles not played).

For 3-4 positions: 2-India beat 5-USA 2-1 (Dipika Pallikal beat Olivia Blatchford 11-6, 11-7, 11-5; Surbhi Misra lost to Amanda Sobhy 3-11, 6-11, 12-10, 4-11; Anaka Alankamony beat Julie Cerullo 3-11, 11-5, 11-8, 10-12, 11-8).

Other Classification: Canada beat England 2-0 (for 5-6 positions); Malaysia beat New Zealand 2-0 (for 7-8); France beat Germany 2-0 (for 9-10); Australia beat South Africa (for 11-12); The Netherlands beat Denmark (for 13-14); Sweden beat Spain (for 15-16).