Nicol Wants To Set An Early Pace

KUALA LUMPUR, July 22 (Bernama) -- Reigning world number one women's squash player, Datuk Nicol Ann David, is all set to give her best in front of the home crowd at the Malaysian Open Squash Championship despite having to adapt to a new scoring system.

The championship will be the first time ever for the women's category to implement the point-a-rally scoring system similar to the men's category, replacing the usual "hand-in-hand-out" system or "best-of-five-games".

"I look forward to that actually. Hopefully, if all goes well tomorrow, it will be a motivation to do well so that I can keep going forward. With the new point system, we will see some surprises and very exciting matches, especially in the first round."

In the qualifying round, we have witnessed some interesting results from this new point system," Nicol told reporters when met at a sponsorship function at Bangunan CIMB here Tuesday.

In the her opening match Wednesday, Nicol will be playing against Hong Kong's Rebecca Chiu.

The tournament starts Wednesday and ends on Saturday.

Also for the first time, participants of the Malaysian Open Squash Championship will be playing in the new RM700,000 glass court, sponsored by Pizza Hut.

"I haven't tried the new glass court yet, but it looks like the same court as the one used in the Seoul Open (South Korea)," said Nicol.

For the record, Nicol has won 28 titles in the Wispa World Tour series and a total of 80 championships which she had competed since 2000.

Other Malaysians competing in the event are Delia Arnold, Sharon Wee, Pushppa Devi, Tan Yan Xin, Lim Yoke Wah, Siti Munirah Jusoh and Low Wee Wern.In the men's category, Ong Beng Hee, Mohd Azlan Iskandar, Mohd Nafiizwan Adnan, Muhd Asyraf Azan, Nafzahizam Adnan, Elvinn Keo and Ivan Yuen are taking up the Malaysian challenge.

-- BERNAMA