Five of the eight top seeds at this weekend’s IACT Irish Junior Open at Sutton and ALSSA in Dublin are Irish players, including recent Spanish Junior Open champion Harry Knox.
The Celtic player will open his BU13 top-of-the-draw account against a qualifier on Friday afternoon, with No.2 seed Ailong Chen of Mount Pleasant also billed to start against a qualifier.
The Irish pair played each other twice recently with Knox winning in three on both occasions, firstly in the third/fourth place play-off at the Danish Junior Open and then in the Ulster Junior Open semi-finals.
Sutton’s Christian Dromgoole, who played for Ireland at the World Squash Junior Championships in Cairo in July, is the BU17 No.1, a campaign he will open against Switzerland’s Harry Motte, the 17/32 seed, on Friday at 10am at his home club.
Scotland’s Murdo MacKenzie is listed as No.2, with an opening round match versus Nick Peter [17/32] from Switzerland.
Rafael Rodriguez Segovia, the Spaniard who was last year’s BU13 title winner, is the No.1 seed in the BU15, with Ireland’s Michael Lai of Mount Pleasant the No.2.
Segovia’s fellow countryman, Marc Altarriba, is the BU19 No.1, with Poland’s Franciszek Michniewicz the No.2.
Ireland have three No.1 seeds in the four girls’ events, Raghad Aboelela (GU13), Zoe Yeomans (GU17) and Riley Slade (GU19).
Mount Pleasant’s Aboelela, who was fourth at the Danish Junior Open, starts in Group A against fellow Irish player Izzy Bailey, the 9/16 from Leinster CC.
Sutton’s Zoe Yeomans, another of the Irish team from this year’s World Squash Championships, is the GU17 No.1. She has a Group A opener against fellow Sutton player Rebecca Jackson [5/8] at 4pm Friday.
Spain’s Siena Hall Rogers, the GU17 No.2, has a Friday afternoon Group B opener versus Kiara Fernandes, the 5/8 from Portugal.
Riley Slade, who also represented Ireland in Egypt, is the GU19 No.1. The Mount Pleasant player will begin with a Group A fixture at 4:30pm on Friday versus Sara Sabry, the Westwood player who recently won the Connacht Senior Open.
Isabel Siobhan Fallon, the No.2 seed from Sutton who came second at the recent Lithuanian Junior Open, will begin her campaign with a 4:30pm Friday Group B match versus Danila Medina, the 5/8 from Spain.
England’s Aditi Rao, the GU15 top seed, will play Ireland’s Chloe Jordan [9/16] of Sutton in her opening match on Friday at 4:30pm in ALSSA.
Spain’s Andrea Gonzalez, the No.2, will start her campaign an hour earlier at ALSAA against Sutton’s Esme Ring [9/16].
The three-day tournament begins at Sutton on Friday morning with four matches scheduled for 9am and the last batch of opening day matches are pencilled in for 8pm. Friday matches at ALSSA are scheduled from 12pm through to 5:30pm.
