Junior Kriel wins first senior title

Junior player Kyle Kriel won his first senior title after beating Sven Gruttemeyer in the A Division final of the Tulipamwe Klein Windhoek Closed Championships last weekend.

The 16-year-old Kriel, who is Namibia’s top ranked junior player beat Sven Gruttemeyer in a hard fought five-set final to win the A Division title, while Nancy Fernandes won the B Division final.

A limited entry draw saw only two juniors, two women and 18 men battling it out in the two divisions of the tournament, with eight men competing in the Men’s A division and 14 men and women in the Mixed B division.

Nancy Fernandes proved that she is not only excelling in the women’s division, by beating all four male opponents on her way to the B Division final, where she beat Daniel Conradie 11-5, 11-8, 4-11, 11-9.

The highlight of the weekend however, was the Men’s A Division where Kyle Kriel caused one upset after another by eliminating his more experienced competitors, one by one.

In the semifinals, Kriel came up against the number two seed Max Endjala, who has excelled in national tournaments the whole year. Endjala featured in most of the finals, emerging either victorious or runner-up to Sven Grüttemeyer, who was the top seed in last weekend’s tournament.

Kriel however proved to be too strong, beating Endjala 8-11, 11-4, 11-3, 10-12, 11-3 in their semifinal encounter.

In the other semifinal, Gruttemeyer beat Wilko Aschenborn to secure his spot in the final.

What followed on Saturday afternoon was an epic five-set battle that kept the spectators on the edge of their seats for 75 minutes. Both players displayed extreme agility and put up their best performances, but in the end it was the junior who had the upper hand as Kriel beat Grüttemeyer 6-11, 12-10, 10-12, 11-2, 11-6 to become the 2015 Klein Windhoek Squash Club champion.

Kriel has made some remarkable progress since his participation in the Junior Squash World Championships, which were held in Windhoek last year and this title is most probably only the first of many.  

The Klein Windhoek Squash Club expressed its thanks to the main sponsor Tulipamwe Consulting Engineers for the opportunity to host the successful tournament.