Sanave-Rupesh clinch NZ title

Rupesh and Thomas had reached the final of the Australian Open Grand Prix last week in Melbourne.

Pallikal loses in semi-final

Chennai: The Indian challenge at the world junior squash championship ended on Saturday after top seed Deepika Pallikal was upset by Egyptian Nour El Tayeb 1-3 in the semi-final.

Trying to become the first Indian squash player to win a world title,Dipika had been favourite to win the match. But the lone Indian remaining in the fray was let down by constant errors. Pallikal went down to fifth seeded Nour 6-11 11-8 8-11 7-11. Ranked 48 in the world,Pallikal lacked ideas against the 60th ranked Nour,who credited her first win over Pallikal to her national coach Adel.

Even I am surprised that everything worked my way. I was not sure that I could beat Dipika until the last point was won. I hope to play in the same manner tomorrow to win the title for me and my country, Nour said.

Pallikals coach Ahmed Mosen admitted that the Indian had had an off day and blamed the loss on her error-prone game. Nour surprised everyone and herself. Today,Dipika could not get off from the base and was very error prone, he said.