Amal storms into European Junior Open G-U15 final.

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Amal Nadeem Izhar - European Open Final 2019
Amal Nadeem Izhar – European Open Final 2019

7th/8th July 2019. Koln, Germany. In the first Girls-U15 semifinal of the day at the European Junior Squash Championship, Amal Nadeem Izhar upset top seed Naomi Nohar in a 70 minute closely fought match. At the ACR Sports Club, court number one, 14-year-old Amal Nadeem Izhar beat European number two Naomi Nohar 9–11, 11–2, 7–11, 11–7, 11–6.

Amal, a quiet understated White Oaks Secondary School IB student and Oakville resident played a strong center game that featured long rallies, drops, counter drops and strong push backs and volleys. Naomi and Amal kept the audience guessing till the last point as they exchanged control of the game and the match with each stroke.

Amal Izhar vs Yuvni Gupta - 8th July 2019. Center Court 1, Cologne, Germany
Amal Izhar vs Yuvni Gupta – 8th July 2019. Center Court 1, Cologne, Germany

Girls U-15 Canadian number two Amal Izhar went on to face Indian number one Yuvni Gupta on Monday, 8th July at 11 am in European Junior Championship finals at the ACR Sports Club. In a 44 minute keenly watched final match Yuvni Gupta won 11-5, 10-12, 11-4, 11-4.

Amal trains at Ontario Racket Club (ORC). This is her first European tournament. Amal is the G-U15 Ontario provincial champion, a finalist the National Junior Championship 2019 – U15 and the US Junior Squash Championship 2018 – U15 Consolation draw winner.

Amal will now continue her European tour and participate in the Dutch Junior Open starting from Thursday 11th July 2019 in Amsterdam. We await the release of the final draws for the Dutch open.

Amal’s coaches include her father Nadeem Izhar, Al Cook and a number of senior players at Ontario Racket Club (ORC). Amal started playing the game and competing in 2016, just three years ago limiting herself primarily to the North American circuit. She was a relatively unknown player at the European championship despite being seeded reasonably well. Nadeem attributes her success yesterday to the phenomenal support network at ORC, her coaches and training partners at the club, the encouragement provided by her teachers at White Oaks Secondary and Amal’s sponsors.

She is here today because of the effort put in by so many well wishers and supporters who have stood with and by her over the last three years. We owe a debt of gratitude to all of them.

Our special thanks from Amal and our family go out to AllanCook (Ontario Racquet Club, Jamie Nicholls (Squash Ontario), Jeff Deverill (Planet Kids), Carlos Loo (Oliver), Mitchell Champaign (Expedia CruiseShipCenters), Kam Sabouri (BenchmarkCorp), Neil Cawse (Geotab), Christine Logan (Franklin Templeton), Robert Brooks, Mike Bertin, Bill Guest, Diana Roper, Jonathan Masterton, Eddy, Bruno, Krish, Rick Craddock and Ahad Raza who made the European tour possible for Amal. There are many other members from our circle of friends, family and ORC that I have missed out. This trophy belongs to all of them, as much as it belongs to Amal.”

Amal’s sponsors for the European tour include Franklin Templeton, Geotab, Benchmark, Expedia CruiseShipCenter Mississauga and Oliver.

FinanceTrainingCourse.com is one of Amal’s many proud sponsors. We are exceedingly proud of what Amal has achieved in the last three years and we wish her the best of luck for the Dutch Open starting this Thursday in Amsterdam.