R1 : Women’s final four

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18.00 Matches

Mayar Hany (Egy) 3-2 Anna Serme (Cze)                      11-7, 1-11, 11-6, 5-11, 11-6 (36m)
Menna Hamed (Egy) 3-2 Melissa Alves (Fra)                9-11, 11-6, 13-11, 6-11, 11-6 (53m)
Mariam Metwally (Egy) 3-0 Cindy Merlo (Sui)                                   11-4, 11-6, 11-3 (22m)
Farida Mohamed (Egy) 3-1 [wc] Nour Aboulmakarim (Egy) 11-9, 15-13, 10-12, 11-8 (44m)

Farida Mohamed (EGY) 3-1 [WC] Nour Aboulmakarim (EGY) 

Nour is one of those extremely talented players coming out of the Egyptian Factory. I have seen her play a lot on the Egyptian circuit. And she wants it. She is 18, WR90 and she probably felt that playing Farida, 19, WR34, was a good opportunity for her to advance to the second round. She didn’t see it as a challenge. But as a chance. And that’s my friends, is why Egyptians young players are so dangerous.

Farida hits Nouran Gohar’s style. But then again, so does Nour. And those two were matching each other pace and energy out there today. Farida, a bit confrontational at times – it’s her way, it’s her intensity – was kept in line by experienced John Massarella, allowing the Alexandria girl to stay focus on the match and not waving away into useless chats with the official.

To be honest, Nour could have won the match on the same score, look at the score, it’s as close as it gets. Yes. 19 et 18 years old. The Future of Egypt keeps looking good to me…

Farida :Mentally today I wanted to play as a top player, not a junior. I wanted to make her feel that she was losing the match 50% because I’m a bigger player, more experienced. Which I guess I managed to do but only at the better end of the match.

At the beginning, it was a point for point squash, with the pressure on me. It was difficult, and she only wanted to play a good match. I was not satisfied with the number of errors I played, especially as they were at crucial times. I feel I was playing too short too soon.

I’m happy that I managed to keep pushing at the end of the games, when it’s close, I often lose the games. But today, I was able to win those games.

She played really well, she never gave up. In the third, although she was down, 10/5, she kept pushing and finally she took that game. But it was good for me as in the 4th, I made sure I was keeping ahead with the score and not letting her come back, because I knew she would have been able to take the game, and maybe even take the 5th. So I knew that I had to take in 4.

Mayar Hany (EGY) 3-2 Anna Serme (CZE) 

Mayar : I had COVID three weeks ago, and I was in bed for a week, so I had very little time to get prepared for the tournament.

Add to that, Anna played really well, I was not expecting her to play that well, she gave me such a hard time on court. I was surprised. But today, I was giving my 100% despite having no expectation.

Today, I was up and able to fight for one game, then I had to rest and recover for the next one, and again the next. I was lucky that the fifth game was a game I was not resting!!

I was doing what I could, I’m just lucky it went my way.