Sundays Well Open 2014 – Report & Results

The inaugural Sundays Well open squash tournament took place on Friday 12th & Saturday 13th December. This event consisted of a Men’s A , B , & C graded competition’s with 8 competitor’s respectively in each section.

The Men’s A final was contested by Philip Mc Sweeney & Jamie Balbuena, this game was expected to be a lively affair & neither player disappointed the large crowd in attendance.

Philip opened up a 2 set lead displaying great athleticism & forced the mistake’s from his opponent with some steady squash & great retrieving. However Jamie battled back hard to narrowly win the third set and force a fourth set which was very closely fought, it looked at this point that Jamie may take the match to a fifth set. This was not to be and Philip held his nerve to close out the match & take the title. In the 3rd & 4th placed play off Pat Hanley put in a good performance & finished in 3rd place with 3/2 win over Ken O’Keeffe.organising

Ross Mc Namara made a welcome return to competitive squash & took the Men’s B title. His opponent was Tony O Brien who gave a great account of himself over the weekend winning 2 good matches to reach the final. Tony battled hard in the final but had to settle for second place against Ross who played good squash & displayed a high level of fitness all through the competition.

The Men’s C final saw 15 year old James Doherty take on Michael Ryan. Michael started the match in great style & raced to a 2 set lead with some powerful play. James struggled early on to cope with Michael’s hard hitting but slowly clawed his way back into the match. With the match even at 2 set’s a piece both player’s made a big push in the 5th set to gain an early lead, however it was James who made the early running & held on to record a 3/2 victory in what was a very good final.

The tournament was a great success & the organising committee would like to thank the Kilkenny group who kindly sponsored the event, the Sunday’s well club for making their facilities available, the players that supported the event, referred matches & generally contributed to an enjoyable weekends squash on the “Banks of the river Lee“.

We look forward to again running next year’s tournament.

Full results were:

A section
1st – Philip McSweeney (Highfield)
2nd – Jaime Balbuena (Sundays Well)
3rd – Patrick Hanley (Highfield)

B section
1st – Ross McNamara (Orchard)
2nd – Tony O’Brien (Highfield)

C Section
1st – James Doherty (Sundays Well)
2nd – Michael Ryan (Highfield)