BLOG: 2006 Junior Men's World Individual Championships

USA had a great run highlighted by a two game loss to #6 Germany and a 2 game loss to Switzerland. If those matches went our way we would have been top 8.

More updates and photos to come. We are off to the team finals and the closing dinner.

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July 27, 2006
Team Stage 2 - 13-18 Round Robin

Blog from Coach Chris Smith
Palmerston North Time: Thursday, July 27 2:27 PM

Team usa defeated Zimbabwae today 3-0. Playing for the US was Trevor, Reed, and Todd. We play japan tonight where we will be playing Trevor. Mark, and Todd.

Blog from Coach Chris Smith
Palmerston North Time: Thursday, July 27 8:36 PM

USA beat japan today 2-1. Trevor and todd won 3-0 to give usa the win. Mark. Won his first game and showed signs of leg pain so we had him retire from the match. The USA is undefeated going into the final day of play. We play Ireland who is undefeated as well. This match will be for 13th and 14th place.

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July 26, 2006
Team Stage 2 - 13-18 Round Robin

Blog from Coach Chris Smith
Palmerston North Time: Wednesday, July 26 9:44PM

We just got back to the hotel from our match vs New Zealand. We won 3-0!!

Its been a long day here. We had our first win this morning vs Finland and had some serious team management issues to deal with all day with all our injuries. Mark's leg, Trevor's ankle, Reed's leg, and even Todd is really sore and needing ice after matches. With Trevor a no go on his ankle all day today, we went up against higher seed (#13) New Zealand with Mark, Reed, and Todd.

Its late and Im tired so Im not going to write a big report. But it was a special day for Team USA going 2-0. Reed played a marathon back and forth match and he won 3-1 in gutsy fashion. Mark, after spending the entire day focusing on treating his leg injury, beat Evan Williams (a 9/16 seed from the indvidual tourney) 3-1. And Todd won a 3-0 dead rubber match to finish the night off.

Thursday we have Zimbabwae at 12 noon and a tough Japan squad at 7:00pm. It will be another test for team usa to stay focused, hydrated, and healthy to stay on the top of the 13-18 pool.

Friday we finish up with Ireland.

Blog from Coach Chris Smith
Palmerston North Time: Wednesday, July 25 4:35PM

In our first match today in the 13-18 spot playoffs, USA beat Finland 3-0. With Trevor's ankle still injured, our lineup was 1. Mark 2. Reed 3. Todd

First up was Reed who won easily 3-0. Mark lost his first game and looked like his leg problems were going to cause major problems. He came back and won the second and third only to tighten up in the fourth which he lost 9-0. I even considered pulling him from the match as he looked in obvious pain. He was playing at about 50 percent and didn't want to lunge very much at all. He went out for the fifth and fell behind 8-3. Then out of nowhere mark decided to turn on the jets. He rattled off 7 straight points to take the game 10-8 and the match 3-2. This gave usa the overall win with one match to play.

Todd Harrity went out and quickly took care of his opponent 3-0.

We play hosts NZ tonight. They are ranked 13th, one spot ahead of us. Our team is beatup, sore, and injured. We have to sit trevor tonight due to his ankle and hope a well cared for Mark and the fresh Todd and Reed can pull out the upset.

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July 25, 2006
Team Stage 1 - Pool Matches

Blog from Coach Chris Smith
Palmerston North Time: Tuesday, July 25 11:00PM

Team USA took on #3 seed England today in the final round of the Pool Play Stage. We decided to rest a very tired Mark Froot to get him ready for Stage 2. England was as advertised and took the match 3-0. USA didn’t just lay down to the powerful England squad and fought hard in every match.

Trevor was up first versus Joe Lee and was in each of the first two games but rolled his ankle after stepping on Joe’s foot late in the second. It was pretty bad and swelled up instantly. Trevor was awarded unlimited time to mend his injury as it was an accidental injury that was contributed by both opponents. Trevor put on a brace and was back on court not wanting to wait any longer for the ankle to swell up even more. He finished the game and had very little left for the third as he was tender to lunge too hard on it. Trevor has been icing since the match and is ready for tomorrow’s match.

Todd and Reed both played some amazing squash today and worked their opponents around a little before the USA bowed out each losing 3-0. USA is into Stage 2 for the remainder of the event.

Due to the number of teams that are competing, the 4th+5th place teams in each pool play off for 13-18th place in a round robin format. That means we have 5 matches left this week and the best we can do is 13th, one better than our seeding. The final teams into our bracket aren’t available yet. We will send another update in the morning.

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July 24, 2006
Team Stage 1 - Pool Matches

Blog from Coach Chris Smith
Palmerston North Time: Monday, July 24 11:00PM

In order for Team USA to have a chance in getting into the 9-12 place playoffs, we needed to beat either Germany or Switzerland. Yesterday’s bid against Germany fell two games short and it was up to our match today against #11 Switzerland.

First to the court was Todd Harrity at #3 making his debut in the team event. Todd, the youngest player on the team, came out like a seasoned pro and took a quick 1-0 game lead with a 9-3 win over Livio Catenazzi. Todd had another stellar win in game two staying off the tin and wearing his opponent down. Livio came out flying in the second game and held a late lead until Todd came storming back. Todd finished Livio off with a 10-8 win to give Team USA a 1-0 lead. This was Todd’s and Team USA’s first individual win in the team event. Todd, who qualifies for the World Championships in 2008, looks to get many more wins in his international career.

Next up on court was Trevor taking on a former European #1 ranked Jr. player Nicolas Mueller. Trevor was outmatched in the first two games going 9-0, 9-0 to Mueller. But Trevor played a near flawless game in the third taking a 7-3 lead. This was Mueller’s day though and he finished off the game 9-7 to knot the match at 1-1.

It was all up to the #2’s who were on next. Mark Froot has played every day for the last 7 days with no rest. Included in there is 4 five game matches. Mark has been very sore and has had some serious right leg issues for the last three matches. Knowing the importance of today’s match, Mark wanted to be on court. Mark won the first game over Benjamin Fischer 9-6 but was in obvious pain on court and in-between games. The second game went easily to Fischer 9-0 as Mark limped around the court. Mark battled back in the third but couldn’t hold off a late charge and lost 9-5. Down 2 games to 1 Mark went all out for game 4 but found himself down 8-4. In typical Mark fashion, he didn’t quit and came storming back to tie things up 8-8. The crowd was going nuts hoping for a fifth game and another chance for Team USA. Mark just missed two tight shots and lost the game 10-8 and the match 3-1. 2-1 to Switzerland.

We have #3 England tomorrow at 3:30 local time to finish up our Pool Play. England has taken down both Switzerland and Germany in the last two days. We will certainly have our work cut out for us. We still have a very very long shot at getting into the 9-13 bracket, but something magical will have to happen. Mark will be getting the day off so we can rest him for the remainder of the week’s competition once the playoff brackets start. Trevor, a very rested Reed, and Todd Harrity will take it to England on Tuesday.

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July 23, 2006
Team Stage 1 - Pool Matches

Blog from Coach Chris Smith
Palmerston North Time: Sunday, July 23 10:42PM

The USA got a very disappointing seeding of 14 from the seeding committee after a stellar individual tournament. The team didn't move up at all from our pre-seeding despite so many great results from the first week. The seeding committee had no answers for us why we were so low and teams that we are obviously better than moved up the rankings. There is no appeal process at these events so us, and a few other frustrated teams, had to go into the pool stage unhappy with our placement.

Due to our seeding of 14, we were placed into Pool C with England (#4 seed), Germany (#6 seed), and Switzerland(#11 seed). The way the pool round works is the top two teams from each of the 4 pools go into the 1-8 place playoffs. The 3rd place team in each pool plays off for 9-12 place. And the 4th and 5th place teams in each pool playoff for 13-18th place.

The team headed into Stage 1 of the Team Tournament with a large task ahead of us, beat both Germany and Switzerland to come in 2nd in our pool and give us a shot at the top 8.

The play order today against Germany was 1-2-3. Trevor took the court vs. Simon Rosner who is a full-time pro player. Simon out played Trevor 9-3, 9-0, 9-0. Mark went on court knowing that he had to win to give USA a chance. Mark was down early in the first game but battled back to take the game 10-8.

Mark went up early in the second but Norman Junge took the game 10-9. He followed up with a 9-6 3rd game and 2-1 lead. Mark came up and took the 4th 9-3. The fifth went quickly to Junge's favor and he got to 8-2 match ball, but Mark made a huge run to get it to 8-6 while fighting off match ball after match ball. In the end, it was Germany's day and the upset wasn't to be. Junge won the match for Germany by giving them the 2-0 win.

Reed hit the court next despite the outcome being already decided in Germany's favor. But Reed was instructed by Preston and I to go out and not save himself for Monday and win his match. Reed took a 2-1 game lead after dropping the first to Florian Sibernagl. Reed just couldnt hold Florian back who took the 4th and 5th game to give Germany the 3-0 final score.

Team USA was two games away from taking down the #6 seed. We feel good and are going to go at Switzerland on Monday with full force.

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