Essex juniors impress with their performances at County Senior Closed

ESSEX junior players more than made their presence felt at last weekend’s County Senior Closed Championships held at Club Kingswood in Basildon.

In a starting field of more that 120 entries, there were 23 of our juniors in the various competitions with the action starting on Friday and not finishing until 8.30pm on Sunday And the trophy ceremony at the end rang out with the names of Essex Junior Squash players who captured many of the key titles up for grabs.

The Ladies’ A final featured two of our best junior players, Elise Lazarus and Alice Green.  The two girls, who are both in the current England set-up, delivered a stellar display thrilling a Kingswood crowd jammed packed to the rafters. There was little to separate the pair but it was Elise who kept her nerve on the big points who claimed the crown winning 3-1.

The Ladies’ A Plate also saw an impressive display by Piper-Rose Tatum. After a tough first-round draw in the main event, Piper re-grouped and battled her way through some tough matches to reach the final of the plate where she only narrowly narrowly missed out to Redbridge’s seasoned campaigner, Evi Kohl.

Our current Under-19 champion Harry Kitchens was another crowd pleaser as he finished off a punishing schedule in the ‘B’ event winning a thrilling final against the hugely experienced Chris Purkiss. Harry’s fist-pump and huge smile at the end showed how much it meant to him and the crowd rose as one to applaud the likeable, Southend lad. And it was another junior, Travis Tatum,  who scooped up the ‘B’ Plate title. His final against Micky ‘Bad Knees’ Calder from Ongar was a masterclass of intelligent squash that elicited the response from his opponent…’Too fast, too smart for me. Nice player’

Former Essex junior and ex-PSA player Niall Engerer has re-vitalised the Senior Closed event running a well-publicised and superbly organised tournament with the help of his Racket-Up team based at the David Lloyd Club in Gidea Park. Niall has encouraged more juniors to compete against the county’s best seniors, and he had nothing but praise for their performances at the weekend.

He was hugely complementary of their court craft and behaviour and heaped praise on the winner of the men’s C event, another of our juniors Zaid Mushtaq. Zaid, who plays out of the Connaught Club, met our very own Brandon Higgins in the final and the two served up another thriller before Zaid held sway to claim the top prize.

But it was the tournament’s youngest player, 13-year-old Lara Newton, who probably shone brightest. Pitched against a hugely experienced field of seniors, little Lara took out the Ladies’ ‘B’ one-seed early doors and went within a whisker of downing the number two in a thrilling five-setter. She finished in the runners-up spot but to say she impressed everyone who watched her would be an understatement. Lara was also court side supporting her fellow juniors, marking matches and coaching one seasoned old timer to the Over-60’s Plate title. (Thanks, Lara…couldn’t have done it without you. LH).