June 1st 2009
May 09 League Summary
In May we had 34 participants in our squash league. As usual the competition was tough and in some cases a game won or lost decided the reshuffle for June.
With just a two point margin, Adam Rafalovich was able to claim the May 09 champion title. Congratulations! Tied in second place were Kartik Gopal and Ravi Lal. I happened to watch their game and it turned out to be a nail-biter, decided only in the 5th game; not to mention the general entertainment value of this battle. Thank you Kartik and Ravi for the on and off court amusement. Joe Zhang was an excellent example showcasing how tough the competition in box A is. Up there any point counts and you can't afford to skip any game. Unfortunately I was taken out by injury this month. I was so looking forward to some tough games, but such is life.
Box B was dominated by Sandeep Dube. Although missing one game, his final score left no question about the winner of this box. Jan Halvorsen, returning from injury, secured the second spot in the box, moving up to box A next month together with Sandeep. Notable was also a very solid performance of Raymund Mui. In the coming month we should also watch out for Shane Oren who started playing squash just a few month ago and for Andres Ariza who consistently improved his level of play every month. The higher you move up, the thinner the air gets.
All players in box C showed expectional dedication of completing all games by the end of the month. Good job! This is the way it should be. In the end Rupesh Shelar clearly lead the field by winning all his matches. The race for second was very very close. Just one point separated Santokh Khalsa and Miles Kingston giving Santokh the ticket to box B. Peter VanDerVorn was one of the solid performers of box C. We might see him soon in box B.
Sada Srinivasan made sure victory of box D was his, loosing only a single game to Mark Brogger who came in second. Dale Walker and Kevin Knoell were fighting for every point tieing in 3rd place.
New league players have made an impact in Boxes E and F. Ivan Castellanos and Jeff Sommers seemed to have the same idea - win it all and take the box. Another newcomer, Jason Giddings, also made a strong showing and is moving up for June. And personally I am looking forward to seeing more action from our youngest league player, Nicholas Zhang. I have seen many of his matches and at times it looks like "David against Goliath". Upper level players - beware of the new wave!
See you at the courts!
Milan
