18 foreign players withdraw from Pakistan Open

KARACHI: As many as 18 high-ranked international players withdrew from the $50,000 Pakistan Open Squash Championships 2017, which is scheduled from December 17-23 in Islamabad, probably due to security issues.

It is to be noted that Professional Squash Association (PSA) has already announced monitoring the security situation during the event which is the first since the lifting of the ban on Pakistan to host international squash events.

The players who withdrew were second seed Omar Abdel Meguid from Egypt, who is world number 27, world number 33 Karim Ali Fathi from Egypt, world number 42 Joel Makin from Wales, world number 74 Jaymied Haycocks from England, world number 80 Adam Murrills from England, world number 89 Michael McCue from Canada, world number 64 Iker Pajares Bernabeu from Spain, world number 106 Aqeel Rehman from Austria, world number 108 Lance Beddoes from New Zealand; world number 112 Mohamed ElSherbini from Egypt; world number 113 Ashley Davies from England; world number 118 Joe Green from England; world number 120 Geoffrey Demont from France; world number 126 Bernat Jaume from Spain; world number 128 Victor Crouin (under-19) from France; world number 138 Alex Noakes from England; world number 279 Ruan Olivier from South Africa; and world number 443 Ali Jafari from England.

However, Amir Iqbal of Pakistan Squash Federation (PSF) said the withdrawals had not taken place because of security concerns. “The players wait till the last minutes to see if the draw favours them. If not, they withdrew,” said Amir.

“Security of the event is all intact and the PSA will monitor it during the event, so this is not the reason behind the withdrawals,” said Amir.

A local coach said that one of the reasons why so many foreign players entered their names in the event in the first place was that the main draw is of 32 places.

He added that it was very difficult for players to get into the main draw of any PSA-50 event so this championship was good opportunity for them and they would surely get benefit from it.