Singh Sidelines Fifth Seed To Reach Open Classic Quarters

Indian Abhay Singh's defeat of England's No.5 seed Adrian Waller led a cluster of upsets on day two of the Open Squash Classic as the quarter-final line-up was decided after a dramatic day of action at Open Squash FiDi in New York.

In a captivating affair on the plaster courts, India's Singh produced his second upset of the tournament to earn a place in his second Bronze-event quarter-final. The No.5 seed looked stronger in game one, outplaying the Indian as he pushed up on the T and controlled the rallies.

Singh responded well, and found his rhythm against the Englishman as he won games two and three 11-9, 11-9. Left-hander Waller surged ahead in the fourth game, showing his quality and confidently dominating the 26-year-old to restore parity at two-all with an 11-2 scoreline.

The two players looked perfectly matched as they picked up points into a fifth-game tie-break. However, the match came to an unusual and disappointing end as the No.5 seed picked up an apparent ankle injury in the tense tie-break, and had to retire just as the incredible spectacle reached its thrilling conclusion.

"When the first game started, I thought I was going to get chopped," said Singh later. "I think I just hung in there and fought hard. It's something I tell myself I need to do to beat opponents at this level and I'm glad that converted into a win.

"I'm working to beat guys like Waller and [Juan Camilo] Vargas. It's the whole point of playing bigger events and coming all the way to New York from India and doing the work back home. I'm just really glad to see the work coming to fruition."

In the women's draw, England's Katie Malliff came back from two games behind to defeat USA's Marina Stefanoni. The American looked the stronger of the two in games one and two as too many errors plagued the Englishwoman. Malliff couldn't keep up with Stefanoni as she rushed to an 11-7 first-game win before furthering her lead after winning a 13-11 tie-break.

Malliff looked sharper as she came on court for the third game, and cut out the mistakes in her play as she took the game to the American, quickly winning the third and fourth games 11-4, 11-6 to go into a decisive fifth. Malliff maintained her momentum and closed out the match just before the hour mark to take her place in the quarter-finals.

"I'm really happy to bring it back after going 2/0 down," said Malliff after the match. "Marina is a really tough opponent, she's very skilful and she takes it in short so well, so I knew I couldn't leave anything loose or else she'd put it away really well. But overall I'm really pleased to get that win."

Elsewhere, India's Velavan Senthilkumar was amongst the players to score an upset in round two, defeating No.8 seed Omar Mosaad. Also defeating favourites, Hong Kong's Ka Yi Lee beat out No.7 seed Nadine Shahin in four games, and Egypt's 17-year-old Mohamad Zakaria defeated No.6 seed Gregoire Marche in the final traditional-court match of the tournament.