Squash World Games 2013: Full First-Round Fixtures List for Competition

Meeting in Cali, Colombia, this week, squash’s biggest names will feature as part of the 2013 World Games with the view of establishing themselves as the sport’s best and brightest.

Back in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, in 2009, it was Nick Matthew and Nicol David who emerged as victors for the men and women, respectively, although the former isn’t present to defend his title this time around.

Spanned across three days of competition, the South American meeting has a bevy of top-class fixtures to showcase this weekend. A number of top seeds are already through to the next round, but there’s still a host of first-round action set to pan out.

All fixtures herein are played on Friday, Aug. 2.

Men’s

Harinder Pal Sandhu vs. Christopher Binnie

Anderson Cardona vs. Yousif Nizar Saleh

Diego Elias vs. Raphael Kendra

Women’s

Mary Fung-a-Fat vs. Franziska Hennes

Catalina Pelaez vs. Edina Szombati

Key Matches

Chris Gordon vs. Ryosei Kobayashi

Now at the age of 27, Christopher Gordon is just off the highest ranking ever managed in his career, slipping to 45th after securing an all-time high of No. 44 in May of this year.

The U.S. veteran came second in the 2011 Pan American Games alongside Julian Illingworth in the doubles event and is set to go up against one of the budding stars of Japan.

Not an awful lot is known about Ryosei Kobayashi, the 19-year-old who in 2010 climbed to world No. 410, which remains the highest peak of the Asian’s career thus far.

In what’s very much a David vs. Goliath battle, Kobayashi will seek to defy the odds against his much older opponent in order to earn a round of 16 meeting with Britain’s Peter Barker.

 

Laura Tovar Perez vs. Thaisa Serafini

The highlight of the women’s first round, Laura Tovar Perez and Thaisa Serafini will clash with the intention of setting up a match against Holland’s Natalie Grinham in the next round of the tournament.

The 16-year-old Perez heads into this encounter with all the home support of her nation behind her, but she faces one of the few big faces left in the women’s first round.

Brazil’s Serafini currently stands at No. 60 in the world and is far and away the favourite for this fixture, but she needs to get past her opposing prodigy in order to do so.

 

Andras Torok vs. Mahesh Mangaonkar

At just 19 years of age, it’s very impressive that Indian representative Mahesh Mangaonkar has managed to crack the top 100 of the official men’s world rankings.

However, the teenager now stands as the world’s No. 88 and is swiftly moving up the rankings, having previously triumphed at the British Junior Open in 2009.

At the opposite end of his career lies Andras Torok, previously world No. 73 but now 34 years of age and simmering out at the latter end of his career.

The Hungarian stands little chance of overcoming the much more spry Mangaonkar, but he will undoubtedly have a few tricks up his sleeve, even at his age.