Amina Orfi became the youngest British Open women’s champion while Paul Coll won his third title in Birmingham after a fatigued Mostafa Asal was forced to retire.
Orfi, current world junior champion, added this major triumph to her senior world title after a whirlwind few weeks of record breaking. She did so after overcoming Nour ElSherbini to break a 94-year record.
The record was previously held by Susan Noel, who was 19 years and eight months old when she lifted the British Open title in 1932.
Orfi – who contested the longest women’s match in British Open history yesterday, the joint fourth longest women’s match of all time – overturned a 1-0 deficit to down ElSherbini 7-11, 11-8, 11-5, 11-8 for a record-breaking win at the Diamond-level event.
“I feel very happy with these two results back-to-back after the World Champs, and I was very tired and it was a great match there,” she said.
“Coming here today, I saw Nour [ElSherbini] throughout the tournament and she was looking very sharp and getting through the earlier rounds easily.
‘I knew I had to be in it from the beginning and I didn’t like the start that I had, but I told myself this is the same thing that happened at World Champs and I knew I could come back.
“She hit some errors and that gave me an extra boost as today I wasn’t feeling that well, and obviously my ankle was hurting and it was weird to move weirdly and incorrectly – but I am just happy it paid off how it did.”
Meanwhile in the men’s event, Coll secured his third British Open title after beating World No.1 Asal 3-1.
Coll, who won back-to-back British Open crowns in 2021 and 2022, battled back from 1-0 down to make it a hat-trick of successes at this event.
Asal, who came through a monumental 115-minute epic with Diego Elias, edged the opener 11-9, but the marathon semi-final yesterday with the Peruvian looked to have taken a huge physical toll on the World No.1.
The reigning World Champion conceded the match at the beginning of the fourth, confirming victory for Coll – his third British Open title and his 33rd on the PSA Squash Tour.
He said: “Mostafa [Asal] had a brutal one yesterday, but I still had to get him today, make him hurt, pick up as much as possible and I’m very happy with that performance. I put in a lot of work since the World Champs to flip the script, very happy with my mentality and squash this week.
“The confidence was always there – it was just about execution. Since the Aussie Open I was focused on World Champs and I got hyper focused on one thing. In training I’ve been hitting the ball really well and the things I’ve been working on have been really good.”
Result – Men’s Final: Quilter Cheviot British Open 2026
[2] Paul Coll (NZL) bt. [1] Mostafa Asal (EGY) 3-1: 9-11, 11-3, 11-6, 0-0 ret. (52m)
Result – Women’s Final: Quilter Cheviot British Open 2026
[3] Amina Orfi (EGY) bt. [2] Nour ElSherbini (EGY) 3-1: 7-11, 11-8, 11-5, 11-8 (64m)