Malta Open

01. Oktober 2016

The second Malta Open took place at the Marsa Sports Club from 23.09.2016 - 25.09.2016. With Esther Dübendorfer, Patrick Bürgi, Florian Dübendorfer, Simon Engler, Graham King, Andreas Neuweiler and Michael Strässle the Swiss selection wasn’t very big, but very successful.

Esther Dübendorfer won gold medals in both Mixed B (with partner Jordan Dainty from GB) and Women Seniors +45, and also a bronze medal in Women Seniors +40.

Michael Strässle won a gold medal in the Men B and together with Simon Engler a Gold medal in the Men B Doubles. Graham King won a bronze Medal in Seniors +45 and Florian Dübendorfer won a silver medal in Men D. This results in a total of 7 medals for the Swiss Team. Congratulations to these amazing results!

The Men B category was dominated by Michael Strässle. With this win Michael proved that his time in the Men B is definitely over and that he belongs to the Elite class. After beating the Great Britain guys Johnny Bispham and Jonathan Spinks in the first two rounds he got to the semi-final where he met Pieter De Bleeckere. After sharing the opening sports 21-11 to Michael and 21-12 to Pieter, Pieter won Squash with 25-23. Michael fought back in tennis and won with 21-7 to earn his place in the final where he had to play against Jordan Dainty. Michael dominated the final and won with 21-12, 21-18, 21-8. After a bad start in table tennis (1-5) Michael played an absolute amazing set in table tennis to make the preliminary decision. After some solid badminton, he secured the win with a concentrated squash performance.

The other Swiss player in the Men B, Andreas Neuweiler, had an unlucky draw in the first round where he had to play against later finalist Jordan Dainty. Unfortunately his other matches went the same way. It was visible that Andreas was not 100% fit due to a foot injury.

In the Men B doubles all Swiss player were seeded and therefore profit from a Bye in the first round. Patrick Bürgi and Roland Pichler were seeded as N°1 and Michael Strässle and Simon Engler as N° 3. If both would have won their quarter finals they would have met in the semis. Both team were looking forward to this match but unfortunately Patrick and Roland lost in the quarter finals against Jordan Dainty/Jonathan Spinks, so this “Swiss-Semi” match didn’t take place.

In the Men B doubles all Swiss player were seeded and therefore profit from a Bye in the first round. Patrick Bürgi and Roland Pichler were seeded as N°1 and Michael Strässle and Simon Engler as N° 3. If both would have won their quarter finals they would have met in the semis. Both team were looking forward to this match but unfortunately Patrick and Roland lost in the quarter finals against Jordan Dainty/Jonathan Spinks, so this “Swiss-Semi” match didn’t take place.

In the Men C Patrick Bürgi and Simon Engler took part. Simon won his first round match against Felix Fischer and then against Jean Michot in the quarter-finals to get to the semi-finals, where he was due to play against Frank Kleiber, the new president from Racketlon Germany. Unfortunately Simon lost against Frank and ended up in fourth place. Patrick won his first round against Brandley Hindle but lost in the quarter-final to the later winner Fabio Leibig. After winning the next two matches he finished the tournament in fifth place. The participation of Brandley Hindle was a small highlight of the tournament. He still is a professional squash player (highest PSA Ranking 64) and won all his three squash matches 21:0.

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