Nour El Tayeb leads women’s points table
By SEAN REUTHE
World No.3 Mohamed ElShorbagy has leapfrogged fellow Egyptian Ali Farag to take the lead on the PSA Men’s World Series Standings courtesy of his triumph at the 2017 Qatar Classic last Friday (November 3).
The top eight players on the men’s and women’s World Series Standings will earn a coveted berth at June’s lucrative PSA World Series Finals and all eight World Series tournaments throughout the 2017/18 season give players the chance to battle for points on the World Series Standings.
Farag’s victory at the first World Series tournament of the season – the U.S. Open Presented by Macquarie Investment Management – saw him take an early lead on the men’s World Series Standings, but his quarter-final defeat to ElShorbagy in Doha, coupled with ElShorbagy’s win over Tarek Momen in the final, sees him drop to second in the standings, 40 points below ElShorbagy, who sits on 165 points.
Momen began the tournament ranked outside the top eight on the standings, but his maiden World Series final appearance has seen him move up to third to make it an Egyptian top three.
The man Momen beat in the quarter-finals, three-time World Champion Nick Matthew, sits a place below the Egyptian in fourth, level on points with German No.1 Simon Rösner, who reached his first World Series semi-final in Doha.
Former World No.3 Omar Mosaad, Peruvian World No.14 Diego Elias and Egypt’s World No.8 Fares Dessouky take the final three spots in the men’s top eight, with the likes of Marwan ElShorbagy, World No.1 Gregory Gaultier and England’s Daryl Selby hovering just outside.
World Champion Karim Abdel Gawad and former World No.1 Ramy Ashour are also outside the top eight and, with the Cathay Pacific Sun Hung Kai Financial Hong Kong Open the next World Series tournament to take place on the calendar, the duo will need to recapture the form that took them to the final of last year’s event if they are to break inside.
Elsewhere, the women’s standings remain unchanged, with Farag’s wife, Nour El Tayeb, leading the way ahead of World Championship runner-up Raneem El Welily, New Zealand’s Joelle King and defending PSA World Series Finals champion Laura Massaro, who make up the top four.
Alison Waters, Annie Au, Nour El Sherbini and Nouran Gohar are the other members of the top eight.
The Hong Kong Open will take place between November 14-19 at the Hong Kong Squash Centre and the Hong Kong Park Sports Centre, with action from the tournament being shown live on SQUASHTV and Eurosport Player. The semi-finals and finals will be shown live on mainstream broadcast channels around the world, including BT Sport, beIN Sports, Fox Sports Australia and Astro.
The 2017/18 PSA World Series Finals will take place in June 2018. For more information on the tournament, please visit: www.worldseriesfinals.com
PSA World Series Standings
Picture and graphic courtesy of PSA