ATCO Super Series Finals – Manchester 2007

Dear PSALIVE squash fans

PSALIVE will be in Manchester this week for the ATCO Super Series Finals 2007 - Adrian and Omar will be live in Manchester providing you with every single point live from the superb Glass court at the National Squash Centre.

We will see how the top players summer training camps have gone as this event begins our new season of World Class Squash coverage on PSALIVE for 2007/08.

We have a truly fantastic line up in Manchester with last year's finalists not even managing to qualify for this event. Our match of the day for Day 1 is a tough one to call with Shabana v Matthew and the first ever PSA Meeting of James Willstrop and Gregory Gaultier both promising plenty of top class rallies. Our match to watch from Day 1 will be World Open Champion, David Palmer and former World Open Champion and ex-World #1 Thierry Lincou of France. These two players represent thirtysomething squash players at this event since the retirements of Nicol and Power and have had some really tough battles in recent year's including that 5 setter in Liverpool when Lincou came back from 2-0 to win a thrilling Liverpool 08 Open 2006.

Egyptian teen squash sensation Ramy Ashour will be making his first appearance in the UK since bursting into the world's top five this year when he makes his debut in the ATCO Super Series Finals – Manchester 2007 this week at the National Squash Centre in Sportcity.

The annual showcase event, which brings together the top eight qualifiers from the previous year's Professional Squash Association Super Series tournaments around the globe, will be staged in the English city of Manchester for the first time, from 9-12 August.

Egypt's two-times World Open champion Amr Shabana heads the star-studded cast. The 28-year-old left-hander from Cairo has dominated the sport since beginning his 17-month reign as world number one in April last year.

Shabana, who is making his fourth appearance in the event, will be joined in the ATCO Group by Frenchman Gregory Gaultier, the third seed and four-times European champion who is making his debut in the event; and Englishmen James Willstrop and British Open champion Nick Matthew, the fifth and sixth seeds, respectively, from Yorkshire.

Ramy Ashour joins fellow Egyptian Karim Darwish in the Manchester Group - both players making their debuts in the event. 19-year-old Ashour followed a distinguished junior career - which saw him become the first man to win the World Junior title twice - by racing up the senior rankings to reach world number two in June!

To qualify for this year's Finals, Ashour claimed two semi-final berths in 2006 Super Series events as well as reaching the final of the Cathay Pacific Hong Kong Open in his maiden appearance in the event. This year, the remarkable youngster has already claimed three Super Series crowns!

But the two Egyptians will face stiff opposition in the Manchester Group from experienced Super Series Finals campaigners David Palmer, the reigning World Open champion from Australia, and Frenchman Thierry Lincou, a two-times winner of the title who is making his sixth successive appearance in the championship.

The four-day championships on the all-glass showcourt in Sportcity will feature three qualifying rounds in each of the pools, leading to finals (on Sunday) which will produce a 1-8 finish.

[3] Gregory Gaultier (FRA)	v	[5] James Willstrop (ENG)	6pm
[7] Ramy Ashour (EGY)	v	[8] Karim Darwish (EGY)	7pm
[1] Amr Shabana (EGY)	v	[6] Nick Matthew (ENG)	8pm
[2] David Palmer (AUS)	v	[4] Thierry Lincou (FRA)	9pm

On behalf of PSALIVE