Sports
Dipika Pallikal clinches Winnipeg squash title
Winnipeg (Canada), Feb 2
After conceding a
game in the opening round, top seed Dipika Pallikal showed her true
class in the Winnipeg Winter Club Women's Open by reclaiming the World
Squash Association (WSA) Challenger 15 title without dropping a further
game.
In the final, Pallikal defeated second seed Heba El Torky,
the 24-year-old World No.26 from Egypt who finished runner-up in 2014,
11-4, 11-9, 11-8 here Sunday to win her 10th WSA Tour title.
El
Torky survived a hard-fought five-game semi-final against Samantha Teran
Sunday, the third seed from Mexico and nine years her senior,
eventually clinching victory on her third match-ball, 10-12, 11-13,
11-6, 11-6, 12-10.
The 2013 champion from India reached the
final, the 15th of her career on the WSA World Tour, after beating Donna
Urquhart, the fourth seed from Australia making her Tour return after a
six-month foot injury break, 11-5, 11-5, 11-8.
Right from the
start of the final, Pallikal looked in full control. She was striking
the ball crisply and cleanly, mixing in an array of wicked offensive
shots, mostly forehanded attempts and well timed flicks.
Perhaps
El Torky's hour and 45-minute semi-final match from the day before had
left her a little exhausted, but Pallikal looked in as good a form as
she had been anytime this week.
After being down 6-10 in the
second, El Torky climbed back to 9-10 capitalising on some errors of
Pallikal, but the unruffled Indian waited for her chance. She was
rewarded for her perseverance after winning a very long backhand rally
enabling her to take the second game.
The third game was a little
tighter, but the outcome looked inevitable as Pallikal rolled on to win
her second Winnipeg Winter Club Women's Open title.