Top two in the Grashopper Groove

Carsten Els reports

The long awaited first semi final between local favorite Nici Müller  and the young Egyptian Karim Abdel Gawad started off semi-final night in Zurich.

During the first game the Swiss crowd had to admit that Karim enforced his game plan over Nici. Playing at a slow pace, but extremely precise, Karim took the first at 11/6.

Hence there was need for a talk during the break: “I had to change something and I am very happy, that I actually found a way to speed up the game,” admitted the home favourite after the match.

In fact Nici entered the Court for Game two and increased the pace and attacked the ball at every possible situation. And the match slowly started to turn.

The second was very close at 11/9 for Nici, but he had the momentum now and kept it going. During the next two games Karim made some easy mistakes, which in the end added up to a 3/1 win in 70 minutes for the Swiss second seed.

The second semi final saw top-seeded Englishman Daryl Selby up against third seed Olli Tuominen.

The seedings and rankings might have been close, but it turned out to be a quite clear verdict in the end, and in just 44 minutes Daryl went through in straight games.

Olli, hard working as always, just did not find a the answer to how to deal with Daryl’s flexible and smooth style. Daryl always had an answer though, and in the end hit more precisely and with less mistakes than Olli.

Needless to say, it was a very fair game, but with these players that’s not a big surprise, as both are well known for their great sportsmanship.

With that, tomorrow we will see the final of the top-seeded players between Daryl Selby and Nici Müller.