March 2010
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Gilly Lane in Montreal, Canada |
First it was Julian lllingworth shocking the men's professional tour a few years ago when he reached the second round of the Tournament of Champions, becoming the first American player to get past the first round of a major PSA event. Now comes Gilly Lane, a US qualifier beating top-seeded Englishman Peter Barker in the opening round of the National Bank Financial Group International in Montreal, Canada, to claim an unexpected place in the quarterfinals of the $50,000 PSA World Tour event at Midtown Le Sporting Club Santuaire.
It was only 24 hours earlier that the US No. 2 from Philadelphia battled back from two games down to beat another Englishman, Robbie Temple, in an 88-minute marathon to earn his place in the main draw.
But Lane, the 24-year-old World No. 59, recovered from a game down to beat Barker (the World No. 7 from London who won his first PSA Tour title in Canada) 7-11, 13-11, 11-9, 11-6 in 63 minutes.
"It was just a very hard fought win," said Lane later. "The court is very bouncy and I was just trying to stick in and play solid squash. Peter's game is something that I try to aspire to so I think I had that in the back of my mind to keep pushing as much as I did.
"I have been working really hard lately and I'm really pleased with this win. It is definitely the best win of my squash career." |
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