Day ONE : Round ONE

World Champs under way in Chicago as Gawad, Elias Lee and Kandra crash out …

It was a busy opening day in Chicago with 32 men’s and 32 womens’ matches across three venues and eight courts.

With the top seeds – plus the home favourites – in action on the glass court as Union Station, it was at Metro Squash and University Club that the other battles for round two places happened.

There was a decent crowd at the station to see the top three seeds in each event progress, with defending men’s champion Mohamed ElShorbagy and third seed Tarek Momen the only ones to drop a game, ElShorbagy against training partner Josh Masters and Momen against home favourite Todd Harrity.

There was better news for the home crowd in the women’s matches as Amanda Sobhy joined top seeds Raneem El Welily, Nour El Sherbini and Nour El Tayeb in the last 32, all winning in straight games.

There was one huge upset at Metro Squash as Youssef Soliman came from two games down to beat 5th seed and 2016 Champion Karim Abdel Gawad in an all-Egyptian upset.

The other seeded casualties in the men’s draw were #10 Diego Elias, beaten in four by Adrian Waller, #12 Max Lee who was outlasted by Ben Coleman in 91 minutes, and #15 Raphael Kandra, beaten by Kong’s Leo Au who joins sister Annie in round two.

There were number of minor women’s seeds (they have twice as many as the men) upsets with Coline Aumard‘s 3-2 win over #28 Nele Gilis, and Melissa Alves‘ close four game win over #29 Sam Cornett making it a good day for the French, and Lisa Aitken, Christine Nunn and Liu Tsz-Ling all making unexpected progress.

DRAWS & RESULTS TWITTER FEED PHOTO GALLERY WATCH LIVE

DRAWS & RESULTS TWITTER FEED PHOTO GALLERY WATCH LIVE