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SQUASH NEWS!
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July 2007:

PARKLANDS KENYA CLOSED TOURNAMENT: Two of our players represented Mombasa Sports Club in the just concluded Parklands Kenya Closed tournament held between the 23^rd-28^th of July. They were Tanveer Diamond (Captain) and Yusuf Zavery.

They played in the men’s category, which was divided into 3 groups A, B and C representing Professional, Intermediate and Amateur players respectively. Both our players were placed in group B. Tanveer lost in the second round to Shawn Khan 3/0 (9-7,9-7, 10-8). Yusuf managed to reach the semi-final stage where he lost to Paul Awora 3/0 (9-6,9-7,9-6).

The players say they have learnt a lot from this tournament in terms of game strategy and new style of play and also solo training tips from Kenya’s top player Prince Mukuka.

The players greatly appreciate the support from Mombasa Sports Club that paid for the traveling cost and the Squash Section for paying for the accommodation. We hope to receive the continued support from the club and section in future.

The section is planning to hold a fund raising event before the year-end and a tournament in a few weeks time.

May 2007:
The section held the Closed Squash Tournament during the period 2^nd - 5^th May 2007. Participants were club Members. Members witnessed competitive games throughout the tournament. The finals saw the Captain Tanveer Diamond up against veteran Vimal Shah with Vimal winning by 3: 1

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SQUASH HISTORY

Squash at the Mombasa Sports Club started around 1930. In 1939 the English Amateur Squash Champion Mr. Gandar Dower played a series of exhibition matches on the Club's court, which did much to stimulate further interest in the game. The original cement floor in the old court was changed to wooden floor in around 1982. At the same time the second squash court was built with the funds coming in when part of the tennis courts were sold to D.T. Dobie & Limited.

At present we have about thirty (30) regular squash playing members with quite a few more joining. The standard of players vary from beginners, medium to top players in the Coast. It is worthwhile to note that it is the only active club for squash on the Coast whereby a player of any standard can get various opponents to play with. The Coast Open Tournament is a regular event at the Club during Easter time with approximately 50 players from allover the country coming down every year. For the last four ( 4) years the event has been sponsored by Athi Stores. The Coast 'Closed Tournament' is normally held around September for the benefit of the Coast players. This event for the last few years has been sponsored by International Distillers (K) Limited.

Currently, the governing body for squash in Kenya -Kenya Squash Rackets Association (KSRA) is doing very little to promote the game at the Coast and the junior players have very little encouragement to get into top ranks in the country. All this can hopefully change in the very near future with the upsurge of a third court -a glass backed squash court. This project is almost at completion. The project had been undertaken about two years ago but the actual building of the court started six months ago.. This is the first glass backed squash court in whole of Coast with a few in Nairobi and one in Kisumu. The project is worth about Kshs. 2 million. The major donor is ABN-AMRO Bank with a donation of Kshs. 500,000/-. The other donations which have either been received through cash, material or services from various other people.