Solnicky and Serme are Czech national champions 2022
Tomas Forter reports, photos by Irena Vanisova
A new men’s champion was crowned as Jakub Solniky triumphed and Anna Serme retained her title in Prague during the Czech national championships 2022. The event was played in two venues in Prague – Hector sport centre and Squash Bowling Centrum.
Quarters
In the women’s quarters Serme won comfortably against Veronika Gaultier. Eva Fertekova beat Tereza Elznicova 3/1. Tereza Svobodova, who took out no. 4 seed Tamara Holzbauerova in the second round, continued her good performances and beat surprise quarterfinalist 15 year old Karolina Sramkova 3/1. In the last quarter Olga Kolarova, former 5-time national champion, took out 2nd seed Natalie Babjukova 3/0.
In the men’s event all went to the seeding up to the quarters. Top seeded Martin Svec beat Ondrej Uherka 3/0. Marek Panacek had to fight hard for 3/2 win against Ondrej Vorlicek. Defending champion Daniel Mekbib had a tough draw against Viktor Byrtus. The score was close at the beginning but at the end of the first game Daniel slightly twisted his ankle, took a 3 minutes break and tried to continue playing but his movement was a bit restricted.
Viktor was able to use it to get 2/0 lead in the games but after that he got a bit nervous, made too many mistakes and lost the next two games. He got his focus back in the fifth and dominated the game to end Daniel´s four years long reign. In the last quarter. Jakub Solnicky managed to beat David Zeman 3/0 although he had to come back from a big deficits in two of the three games. .
Semis
The Womens semis saw another easy win for Anna Serme against Eva Fertekova. The second semi brought the biggest upset of the tournament. Tereza Svobodova played her own fast and attacking squash to go 2/0 up against experienced Olga Kolarova. Olga managed to get into the match and levelled to 2/2. Tereza however started the fifth very well and managed to keep the lead till the end and celebrated her first final of the national championships.
The first mens semi brought a big battle between top seeded Martin Svec and last year’s finalist Marek Panacek. Marek got the first game, Martin levelled the score. Marek was able to get 2/1 lead but Martin started to play more accurate squash towards the end of the match and managed to win the fourth and fifth to reach the final of nationals for a third time.
Jakub Solnicky played his teammate and training partner Viktor Byrtus in the second semi. He seemed to be in control in the whole match and although Viktor came close in the second Jakub won 3/0 and reached his third final same as Martin.
Finals
The Women’s final started with both players were a bit nervous. Anna soon realized she was able to control most of the rallies, calmed down and comfortably managed to push Tereza Svobodova into taking too much risk and make mistakes with her very good movement. Tereza did hit some nice winners but it was not enough in the final. Anna won her 4th national title after 3/0 win. The Bronze medal was won by Eva Fertekova who beat Olga Kolarova 3/1.
It was third time lucky for Jakub Solnicky in the men’s final. First game brought some very long rallies where Martin Svec was in control of the most of them but Jakub always managed to stay in those rallies with his good movement and defence.
As soon as he had chance he was able to push Martin to the 4 corners and Martin started to hit the tin too many times. 11/6 for Jakub. In the second Jakub played super tight squash. His accuracy frustrated Martin who gave up half way through the game. Jakub 11/2.
Martin managed to calm down in the break before the third. Started the game very well, got a good lead and managed to keep the lead till the end. Martin 11/5. Jakub got control of the match back early in the fourth and comfortably won 11/3 and started to celebrate his well deserved first national title.
In the bronze medal match Viktor Byrtus beat Marek Panacek who was more tired from his previous matches 3/0.
