Team USA’s Amanda Sobhy reached the 2015 NetSuite Open semifinals Saturday night after a comfortable three-game victory over Tesni Evans on the NetSuite Challenge Court at Justin Herman Plaza in San Francisco.
Sobhy, the $25, 000 women’s draw top seed, needed just twenty-six minutes to dispatch the Welsh world No. 28 11-7, 11-1, 11-8.
“I love playing in the US because the crowd is so amazing and when people come and support me it makes me want to push harder and play my best and to play at this venue is amazing, ” Sobhy said. “I’ve finally finished with school so this year my focus is to try and enjoy being a full-time pro and not to try and squeeze in all the events I haven’t played due to studying.
“If I can stay injury free and keep pushing hopefully I can crack the single digits in the rankings and put in some good performances in the bigger tournaments and see how it all goes.”
Sobhy’s semifinal opponent is Denmark’s Line Hansen, who eliminated Sobhy’s Pan American Games teammate Olivia Blatchford in a three-game quarterfinal at Bay Club San Francisco Saturday after noon.
It was a late night at Justin Herman Plaza with two five-game men’s quarterfinals bookending Sobhy’s match.
Both matches saw the losing player squander multiple match balls, allowing their opponent to claw back into the game and eventually win the match. Four seed Miguel Angel Rodriguez fought off two match balls in the fourth game to come back and win in five against Australia’s Cameron Pilley, 6-11, 11-3, 8-11, 14-12, 11-8, in 108 minutes.
“Cameron played very well tonight and I had to play at 100 per cent in the entire match to try and match him, ” Rodriguez said.
“He’s a very talented player and he was playing amazing today. I was focusing so much on retrieving the ball and not making a mistake in that forth game, which was crucial, and I was lucky to win the match.”
The final match of the evening was between top-seeded Nick Matthew and Germany’s Simon Rösner. Rösner powered to a 2-1 lead after three games, but with match ball at 10-7 in the fourth, Matthew dug deep to fight off three match balls, then later a fourth in the tie-breaker to force a fifth game 13-11. Matthew carried his momentum into the fifth to win the game and match 11-7 in ninety-seven minutes.
“I’ve a good head to head record against him and normally I’ve broken him down after a game or two but tonight I never felt like I did that and I had to fight for every point, ” Matthew said.
“He was taking the volley away from me and mentally I had to put in so much focus to every shot that I struggled to implement my game plan. I had to dig deep and all credit to him as that’s the best he’s played against me.
“I used all my experience in that fourth game to make sure I didn’t panic and stay composed but aggressive as well. There were a lot of guts in there as well because I just didn’t want to lose tonight.
“Once it got to the fifth I felt like I had the momentum and the experience behind me. I thought that if I managed a good start then I could push on and I’m happy I managed to do that.”
The two remaining men’s quarterfinals and women’s semifinals will be streaming live on SquashTV Sunday evening starting at 7pm local time, 10pm ET.
SquashTV Schedule:
19:00 [4] Ramy Ashour (EGY) v [Q] Ryan Cuskelly (AUS)
20:00 [1] Amanda Sobhy (USA) v [7] Line Hansen (DEN)
20:45 [8] James Willstrop (ENG) v [2] Gregory Gaultier (FRA)
21:45 [5] Victoria Lust (ENG) v [2] Sarah-Jane Perry (ENG)
To view all draws, to purchase tickets, and for more information visit www.netsuiteopensquash.com, likeNetSuite Open Squash on facebook, and follow @NetSuiteOpenSquash on Twitter.