Six different nations take titles at Swiss Junior Open

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Six different nations take titles at Swiss Junior Open

Last weekend's Swiss Junior Open saw trophy winners from six different nations as 157 youngsters braved the heavy snow to compete at beautiful Langnau am Albis near Zurich.

Czech Republic's Martin Stepan was the boys' Under-19 winner - going one better than his runner-up finish in his last ESF event, the Nordic Junior Open U17 final.

Stepan, who is based at Squash Viktoria in Brno and coached by legendary 18-time Czech champion Jan Koukal, overcame Germany's Finn-Lennart Koch in the final in Zurich, 13-15, 11-7, 12-10, 11-7.

The girls' U19 draw was completed in a round-robin format, with Germany's highly promising Maya Weishar completing a clean sweep of five victories to take the title. 

The most crucial match was Weishar's last on the Sunday against second seed USA's Avery Park, which was essentially a title decider with both women 4-0 at that point. The 17-year-old from Leutenbach held off a strong Park comeback to take it 11-4, 11-3, 9-11, 7-11, 11-1.

Marc Altarriba was the victor in the boys' U17s - his second title in a row following his win at the recent Irish Junior Open in Dublin. The Spanish junior champion took four games to overcome Japan's Shunsaku Kariyazono in the final, having knocked out home favourite and top seed Fabian Seitz in the semis.

There was Swiss success in the U17 girls' draw, however, as Maja Maziuk sailed serenely through the weekend with dropping a game, beating Czech Republic's Aneta Sezemska 11-9, 11-5, 11-4 in the final.

France were the winners in the boys' U15 category - but it wasn't top seed and recent Irish Junior Open winner Theo Baudry. He was forced to retire at 9-8 in the opening game against his compatriot Ethan Lecordier in the final. Top seed Natalia Mierzejewska of Poland took the girls' U15 trophy after going unbeaten throughout the robin-robin event - all five of her wins in straight games.

The lower-age draws also went to Polish players - Hania Gorecka taking the girls' title without losing a game and Kacper Stachowiak winning a great boys' final 11-9, 14-16, 12-10, 11-5 over Egypt's Anas Tawfik.

The event was the final ESF junior 'Super Series' event of the year. The next junior event is the Scottish Junior Open (Grand Prix) in Edinburgh from 28-30 December.

Check out the full results from the Swiss Junior Open here.

 

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