Qatar’s Abdulla al-Tamimi survived a scare to enter the second round of the British Open in Hull, England, yesterday.
In a thrilling first round match at the Allam Sports Centre, World No 38 al-Tamimi overcame USA’s World No 48 Shahjahan Khan 3-2.
Al-Tamimi took the first two games of an entertaining affair 11-8 and 11-7. Khan fought back well in the third, as the World No 48 forced al-Tamimi into a number of errors and took the game 11-4. Sensing an opportunity, Khan continued to press in the fourth, winning the game 12-10 to force al-Tamimi into a fifth. Al-Tamimi, however, regained his composure well in the final game, completing the match with an 11-6 victory.
He will take on Egyptian World No 17 Omar Mossad in the second round of the Platinum event on the Professional Squash Association’s (PSA) World Tour.
The Qatari player is coming off a good run in the Manchester Open where he narrowly missed out on a chance to reach the last four as he fell to Egyptian World No 5 and top seed Marwan El Shorbagy at the last-eight stage. He had also displayed his excellent form in the second round where he defeated the fifth seed Colombian Miguel Rodriguez.
“I feel pretty relieved, (Khan) played unbelievably well today. In the first two, I controlled the games a lot better but then he started picking more balls up as the match went on and I tried to go lower and lower, which was the wrong thing to do. I really had to push myself to 200mph in the fifth, because although I get really fatigued, I know if I play at that pace I can win a few rallies in a row. I learned from the El Shorbagy game to make sure I played decent, longer rallies instead of just going for shots,” said al-Tamimi.
In the early match yesterday, former World No 9 Daryl Selby fell to wildcard Nick Wall in the opening round. He started strongly, winning the first four points of the match, but Selby showed his experience to fight back to take the first game and hold the advantage in the match. However, from that point, Wall was able to fight his way into the contest, and he went on to take the next three games, to secure victory on his first appearance at the British Open.