Eight-time World Champion, 112 months as World #1, voted the Greatest of All Time by her peers and the public, Datum Nicol David has announced that she will retire from professional squash at the end of the season.
Statement from Nicol
After more than twenty years playing squash for Malaysia, competing on the professional tour and achieving the utmost best from my career being the only Malaysian athlete to achieve these accolades and to be recognised as the greatest female squash athlete of all time by my peers, I can proudly say that I am ready and happy to announce my retirement at the end of this seasonal tour.
This is a moment that every athlete must go through – to explore fully on what more there is in store for them. I am now at this point in my life, ready to take on more beyond the pro tour.
This decision has been thought through for quite some time and I do know this is my last season. My mind and body have battled it out to stay at the very top of my game for such a long time that I feel that I only have this last big push left for the final season to give it all I have before I enter the next phase of my life.
I love squash with all my heart, and it will always play an important role in my life. Which is why I would like to give back in three ways:
1. To Squash by joining PSA to work with them closely to raise the awareness of our sport globally and to build a support team for our professional squash athletes as they continue to raise the bar on tour.
2. To Malaysia’s younger generation through the Nicol David Foundation which seeks to empower girls through sport to reach their full potential. This will be refined fully in a strategic partnership with PwC to create the best structure and programme moving forward to have more girls playing sport, improve their study skills and soft skills too.
3. To the People in Malaysia, I will be sharing my story, ‘Nurturing Belief’, through a series of talks and writings.
This is just the initial start of more exciting things planned and I cannot wait to venture into this next phase with all of you after my squash on tour.
Throughout these next few months till the end of the seasonal tour in June, I will be sharing through my ‘The Dream Remains’ campaign, everything that my life in squash has given me.
I would like to enjoy my last few tournaments together with everyone through this campaign in the hopes of giving all a chance to have their own dreams to go forth the way I plan to keep striving for.
Thank you from my heart for the amazing support from all of you, the Ministry of Youth and Sports, the National Sports Council and the Institute of Sport Malaysia, Penang Sports Council, all Squash associations involved throughout my career – SRAM, SRAP and The Penang Squash Academy. My technical and support team with the incredible Liz Irving working with me for sixteen wonderful years together – what a great journey it has been!
Not forgetting all the sponsors throughout my career with two long-term partners, CIMB and Hotel Equatorial. To my current sponsors – Wilson, Mercedes-Benz Malaysia, Hotel Equatorial, eXpede and Asics – thank you for continuing to see me through my current squash excitement and to my future prospects to come.
The media, locally and internationally, have been very supportive of my squash career and I am thankful for all your contribution. I will meet the media on the evening of the 27th of March in Kuala Lumpur. Details will be forth coming.
This unimaginable squash journey would not have happened without my family’s love and guidance to take me through everything and now more! They are the heart of my success and right now, it is how I can contribute to a bigger purpose to fulfil my mission in life.
All my friends from all over who have been by my side in every way, in every step, I will always be grateful for their constant support and will be with them more than ever as I go through these moments after my squash pro tour.
Thank you to all my fans, my supporters and my followers for journeying with me all these years. I would like to encourage all of you to keep on rooting for me through the exciting
movement I am taking on for Malaysia and for squash!
The Dream Remains #thedreamremains
8 x World Champion
10 x Hong Kong Champion | 5 x British Open Champion
3 x World Games Champion | 9 years at World #1
5 x Asian Games Champion | 2 x Commonwealth Games Champion
World Squash Says :
Today’s announcement in her home country Malaysia that Nicol David is bringing to a close her illustrious playing career in squash signals the end of a unique era in the sport.
Since making her debut on the international stage in 1996 when she won the British Junior U14 Open title as a 12-year-old, this formidable woman from Penang has blazed a phenomenal trail through the sport, creating record after record. Now 35, David became the first player to win two world junior titles in 2001 before going on to accumulate a record eight senior individual world titles amongst a total of 81 PSA World Tour titles from 102 final appearances.
In 2015, David established a record 109-month unbroken run as world No.1 – and in Malaysia she is recognised as the country’s most successful Asian Games athlete with 7 gold medals (5 individual and 2 in team championships) in the quadrennial event.
David was inducted into the World Squash Federation ‘Hall of Fame’ in 2011.