I’ll combine my last two matches in one post in which I played at the Grasshopper Cup in Zurich.

In my 2nd Round Qualification match I played the experienced Italian, Davide Bianchetti. In this match Davide’s ever reliable tight lengths, forced some loose balls and squeezed errors into my game with the first game going for 30min with Davide taking it in a long game.

The 2nd game Davide was not giving me any angles or space off the walls and was really playing well and patient squash taking the 2nd in around 15min.

The third was also close at the start but Davide sustained a lead and never let me back into the match winning it in 3 in around 60min. I was a bit disappointed with the match but I also realized Davide constant pressure with his tight lengths restricted my free flowing play.

What was to come next was quite a bitter sweet feeling for me, as one of the guys in the main draw pulled out which left a spot for a lucky loser to be drawn from the losers from the 2nd round qualifying.

It was lucky for me that my name got drawn out and had a second lease of life getting a valuable chance in playing in the main draw.

My opponent was the world no.24 and 3 seed of the tournament Olli Tuominen of Finland. So with having another chance I felt more relaxed and ‘nothing to lose’ so to speak. With this approach I gave it everything narrowly losing the first 10-12. Much the same in the second game but managed to level the match in winning the game 17-15 in a 30min game. The third we both exchanged points early, then Olli made some unforced errors and a few of my winners and I took the game 11-5 in around 7min. Again in the fourth we were both moving each other around the court, changing the pace and angles, exchanging point for point all the way up to 9-9. The next rally I played a nice tight length to earn myself a match ball. That soon faded where Olli went for an all or nothing straight nick off my serve (which wasn’t a bad serve) which squared it at 10-10.
The next two rallies Olli won, with the first of the points with me clipping the tin and the 2nd with not being able to retrieve a tight drive from Olli.

The last game I was feeling the affects, of the match the day before and this match was already been played 1hr 20min. Olli managed to keep the pace high and was just not moving how I was earlier in the match and he got a run of points and took the game 11-4 and the match 3-2 in 95min.

So after getting my second chance, I almost took full advantage of beating the no.3 seed of the tournament, but it wasn’t to be. Again for me is such a valuable learning experience which will get me ready for the season after the summer.

So the next event for me, will be the French League Finals in June and after that a good solid training during the summer to prepare for the 2nd half of the year.

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Steve Finitsis - Squashplayer

Today was my first round Qualification match here in Zurich where I played young Swiss player Lukas Burkhart.

I won the match 3-0, 11-2, 11-2, 11-6 in 17min. I was playing quite well using the four corners well, high pace and 17 inch tin to my advantage.

My match tomorrow will be against the experienced Italian, Davide Bianchetti who also won his first round 3-0 today.

I’ll keep you updated after tomorrow’s match which will be at 17:30 local time here at the Grasshopper Club in Zurich.

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Steve Finitsis - Squashplayer

Today was a day down the courts, but instead of competing in a tournament, I was in a coaching roll watching my student Mitchel Kries shoot for his third Club Championships Title in the Dutch town of Beverwijk.

I was happy to say that he won the championship in style as he didn’t drop a game throughout the tournament.

So for me it was a proud moment to see Mitchel take the Championship and to share that feeling as a coach was something special.

Congratulations to Mitchel and certainly looking forward to working more with him and keep raising the bar/goals with him in future.

Well done champ!

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Steve Finitsis - Squashplayer

Last weekend I played for my French League team Valence. This was the last round of the regular season before the play-offs, and my team was sitting in the top 4, but with a good team performance in these matches could potentially sit in first place for the play-off finals.

The team consisted at the Number 1 spot Nicholas Meuller, 2 – Greg Marche, 3- Myself and 4 – Jerome Dadot/ Florent Pontiere.

Our first match was on the Friday evening against La Rochelle in Nimes. All of us won our matches 3-0 and a great battle for Jerome our number 4 who won in 5.

The next 2 rounds were played at our home courts in Valence, where there was a great atmosphere with a lot of people coming to support the team. First up was the number 4′s where Florent played Roanne where Florent won 3-0 to give first blood to Valence over the Aix en Provence team. Next on was the number 1′s Nicolas Muller played Yann Perrin. Nick was playing his attacking shots in the first and gained the upper hand and won it quite comfortable. The second game started off well but Yann resisted the attacks with some of his own squeezing the second game 16-14. With this moment shift Yann was able to sustain a lead, with also help from numerous errors form Nicolas racket (mostly due to playing on the higher tin again, coming from the lower tin in El Gouna is always hard to adjust) managed to win the match 3-1, making it 1-1 after two matches played.

Third on was the number 2′s and home local player Valence’s Greg Marche was up against Fabian Verseille. With both players having a similar style , liking to go for some shots, it was Greg who got the first, slipped a bit in the second where Fabian got a bit of a roll on, but Greg regained his composure to take the next two games and the match 3-1 at his usual lightning pace. So Valence at this stage were up 2-1 in matches and now it was my turn against the young Frenchman Geoffrey Demont. I managed to move Demont well around the court while keeping the pace up in the first to take a 1 game advantage, but too much x-courting and not enough structure got me out of reach and lost the second. Coming back I was really focused not to do the same and played basic, controlled squash to take the match 3-1 and give my Valence team a 3-1 win against Aix en Provence.

Our second match which was played later in the afternoon was against Mulhouse. Jerome started proceedings with a strong performance against Yuri to take the match 3-0. Second on was the Swiss number 1 Nicolas Muller against the Hungarian number 1 Mark Krajcsak which went the full distance, where Nicolas was up 2-0 and Mark levelling it and going up 10-6 match ball only for Nicolas to save 4 match balls and take it to 10-10. A persistent Mark kept pushing and in the end won the match 3-2 to level the matches at 1-1.

The number 3′s Greg Marche was up against Mulhouse’s Joan Lezaud. This match saw some fast paced attacks, lightning movement, unforced errors but in the end it was Greg’s constant pressure and speed that won him the game 3-1 and take Valence to a 2-1 lead.

Again it was myself (the oldest in the team lol) to try and seal it for Valence. In my way was the very experienced Australian (former world no 15) John Williams, who lives and coaches in Switzerland. Right from the get go, I made sure I was taking the ball early and moving John around as I didn’t want him to have time playing the ball being a great shot player. I won the match 3-0 with John putting up a good fight in the second.

So my team won the tie 3-1 and first position on the table going in to the French League Play-offs. With all teams being at full strength for the finals, it will be a big mountain to climb, but with the spirit and bond of the Valence team.

We know anything is possible, as we won the title last year which was quite a huge surprise and shock as we all played so very well and made a few upsets along the way to claim Valence’s first 1st Divison French League Title.

So in June, my Valence team will go to Aix en Provence to defend the French League title.

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Steve Finitsis - Squashplayer

Yesterday was my 1/4 final match against the current Irish No1 Arthur Gaskin. The court was very lively and the rallies very long.

It was a closely contested match from the start where I managed to take the first two games 11-9, 12-10. The next game was close all the way up to 7-7, with a few winners and untimely errors from myself Arthur took the game 11-7.

The fourth I re-focused and got a good start to the game and lead 9-4, only to be pegged back with some determined retrieving from Arthur. It went the full distance almost being two games in one, going to and fro from game/match ball eventually losing it 18-16.

The final game now clocking over the 1hr 30min mark both of us were starting to feel the effects of the match and conditions. Again it going neck and neck, then with Arthur taking a mini lead at 9-7. At that point my right quad tightened up after 1hr 50min of play and couldn’t move freely for the remainder of the match losing it 11-7.

All credit to Arthur, I certainly had my chances but couldn’t convert the all important points.

So it’s back to training and think about making my overall game and preparation better and to be more consistent in the big points to get ready for the Grasshopper Cup in Zurich at the end of this month.

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Steve Finitsis - Squashplayer

After arriving in Galway yesterday afternoon from a short flight from Eindhoven and a 3 hour bus trip from Dublin, I settled into the bed and breakfast which is conveniently next door to the squash club.

After having a hit yesterday with Dylan and Rasmus and again this morning, I’m looking forward to playing my first round match later today.

My opponent will be the wildcard Stuart Hadden (Ire) where I’ll be first on court to start the day off at 17:00 local time.

I will keep you all updated on my result after the match today.

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Steve Finitsis - Squashplayer

This is a story I thought I’d share with you all, where now I can laugh at it, but at the time was a nightmare!!

It all started with my early Sunday morning flight from Winnipeg to Montreal via Toronto, which happened to be the same day as my first round qualifying match which was scheduled for 13:30. This wouldn’t of happened in the first place if I double checked my flight itinerary, where I was thinking I was leaving Saturday morning, when it was actually Friday morning. (Note to self, never do that again).

After many phone calls to my girlfriend, who was frantically looking at next available flights and lots of asking at different airline desks, I managed to get a flight Sunday morning, where at the start my girlfriend suggested this flight, but the airline didn’t before.

I’d also liked to thank the Brand’s (my Winnipeg billets for my stay there and also the extra stay and trips to the airport).

So the next available flight was the one I was taking, due to Air Canada canceling/having problems with the airline (perfect timing).

So the connecting flight from Toronto to Montreal was suppose to give me a 2hr + time to get to the courts which I was told it only takes 30 min max from Airport to the Squash centre.

Instead the ticketer on Sunday morning at the desk told me the Toronto/ Montreal flight cancelled and another flight was leaving an hour later. So 2 hours turned to 1 hour to get to the club.

Everything was running smoothly from the flight running on time arriving a little earlier, getting my bag and Raphael Kandra’s (My traveling squash buddy) bag off the belt first and got in a cab in record time to head downtown Montreal with plenty of time to spare.

As Raphy and I got closer to downtown Montreal, I noticed a few people people were wearing all green but I knew the day before was St Patrick’s day so I didn’t think much of it. Then the cab driver in a French/English accent said I can’t go any further then about 100m away from the club as there was a St Patricks Day Parade. So Kandra and I asked the driver ‘So we just go through the crowd and it should be ok’? He said ‘yeah’. I had 45min before my scheduled match and thinking I’ll be fine but as we both walked closer to the sea of green, there were police barriers blocking the street off and this travelled a long way in both directions.

So I asked one of the policeman on duty if we could just cross the road and of course it wasn’t possible (where I could hear bagpipes and cheer of 200,000 plus people celebrating the parade). My next question was, when does the parade finish and the road re-open? 2hrs was the reply!! I then asked, is there another way to get through or around? So as time was preciously passing by and asking people for ways to get around, I was told to go via an underground shopping centre and go up through the otherside to where I have to go. At this stage, Rapha went to the other club to meet up with his gf and also was playing at later time. As for me I was in this shopping centre that looked like a labyrinth with my way out, seeming impossible to find I managed to find my way out and found the Montreal Squash Club being 5min late for my match! Luckily the match before me, went to 5 games (Thanks, Cesar & Anthony) and I had a bit of cooling down time (not warming up as I was pretty warm running around the Labyrinth/underground shops before).

So after all that I managed to get one of my best results in reaching the 1/4 final of a bigger tournament. Looking back, the luck of the Irish almost rained on my parade that day with a sea of 200,000+ green people!!

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Steve Finitsis - Squashplayer

Yesterday was my 1/4 final match against the defending champion, 1# seed and current World No.11 Hisham Ashour (Egy).

Due to the record warm temperatures here in Montreal for this time of year, the ball was very lively and the matches long.

My start to the first game was perfect, mixing shots and attacking when the opportunity presented itself. Having a few points buffer I took the first game 11-7.

The 2nd game was a battle of who could dominate the T to find an opening for the winning shot and Hisham took the game 11-8.

The 3rd game was much the same with both of us taking advantage of some angles and kills if presented to us but down to the business end was where Hisham closed the game 11-7.

The 4th I regained my composure to play some great rallies to have a 9-6 lead. Then followed some lengthy rallies where Hisham clawed his way back to give himself match ball. I saved 2 match balls but Hisham converted his third attempt, winning the match 3-1 (7-11, 11-8, 11-7, 13-11) in a bit over 45min.

This tournament and match has given me a lot of confidence, in knowing the things I have trained/worked on are coming to fruition and also on things I can better in my squash game for the near future.

It’s been a great Canadian Tour and looking forward to my next Tournament which will be in Galway, Ireland at the start of April.

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Steve Finitsis - Squashplayer

Today was my Round 16 match against the Czech No1 Jan Koukal. Right from the first game it was neck and neck between us with scores all the way up to 7-7 and I managed to take it 11-7. The 2nd was much the same as we were both trying to find our length to create some opportunities up the front. Koukal had a lead of 8-7, then I was able to take some important points to win the game 11-8. Third was tight again going all the way to 7-7 again and just really hung in the last few points to take the game 11-7 and the match 3-0 in around 50min.

These games could of easily gone the other way and am happy to get off with a 3-0 victory.

Tomorrow at 18:30 local time, I’ll play my Quarter-final match against the 1 seed from Egypt, Hisham Ashour and current World 11.

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Steve Finitsis - Squashplayer

Last night I qualified into the main draw in Montreal where I won a tight 3-1 match against Chris Gordon in around 75min. (11-2,9-11,11-9,13-11).

My first round match in the main draw is against the Czech No1 Jan Koukal at 13:15 local time.

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Steve Finitsis - Squashplayer