Wimbledon Racquets & Fitness Club AGM 2016
Squash Section Report
1. The squash season started with the Summer Graded Tournament in July 2015, which attracted close to a maximum entry. More squash entries are staying on for the evening social which is adding to an excellent club atmosphere. Wimbledon’s young first team player, Kyle Finch was the winner of the A grade in a high quality event.
2. A new Ladies only event was launched by Tina Fuselli in the first weekend of September. It was a tremendous success attracting 33 entries across the County and Region.
This year we have added on a club Casino evening event in aid of the charity Breast Cancer Care. A Badminton tournament is also being run in tandem. The event will be on the 3rd September. We sincerely hope that the whole club embraces the night and we can raise as much for the charity as possible.
3. The Club once again hosted the Surrey Junior Closed in September 2015. There was a huge increase in entries to 150 juniors in Surrey participating which shows great signs for our sport.
The club’s junior academy once again showed what a great set up we have here at WR &FC winning 5 of the titles.
4. The committee were delighted to host another fantastic Semi Pro - Wimbledon Cup Event this year which was held at the end of October/ Early November. We are very grateful to event sponsors Ryan Leisure Ltd, Roehampton University, Russell-Cooke Solicitors Equity Invest & Unibet for their on-going support of this prestigious event which has run for over 40 years.
The men’s final was contested by two Wimbledon players with Ben Coleman taking the title after defeating Lyell Fuller.
The ladies final was won by a Wimbledon member for the first in its history. Yathreb Adel who is training at Wimbledon while she studies at Roehampton University won the ladies title with a 3-1 over former World no.3 Madeline Perry.
5. The Warren Cup was well organised by Jim White, who increased the draw meaning we needed a qualifying round. This event is played between January & March and is for the gold and silver league players. It is a handicap format, which keeps interest across standards. The final saw Colin Patch take the title & Ron Gavin was this year’s runner-up.
6. Andy Wales has taken the friendly fixture list onto a new level by adding 18 fixtures to the calendar for our second season. The fixtures give our lower team/non-team players more opportunity of team squash around Surrey & the London area.
7. The committee ran the Racketball Club Championship separate to the Squash Championships for the first time this year to try and boost entries and participation in the sport. It worked very well & saw an increase in entries. The event was won by Seigo Masuda who defeated Nick Williams in the final.
The club’s Racketball team has made good progress in the Surrey’s Division 1 ending the season with a 3rd place finish.
8. The middle weekend of March saw the club host the qualifying rounds of the 2016 Canary Wharf event for the ninth consecutive year. We announced the event was a sell-out a week before the start. The spectators are always treated to world class squash all weekend and the date has been set next year for us to host the event for the tenth year!
9. The annual Club Championships was a great year for squash as the number of entries continues to rise, this year up to 173 entries. The event ran smoothly throughout & we had a great finals day of squash & entertainment.
Phil Rushworth & Rawan Elkalaawy retained their Open Club Championship & Ladies titles respectfully.
10. The club hosted another Bronze Junior Event, sanctioned by England Squash in February. Tina Fuselli & Phil ran the event which saw a slight increase from last year, attracting 87 entries across U11 to U19 boys and girls categories. WRFC is very well thought of when it comes to hosting such events.
11. A big thank you goes to all our team captains who have helped the club teams throughout both the summer & winter seasons. We have 6 very strong Mens Surrey Cup and 2 ladies teams we are very encouraged to see more players getting a taste of team squash.
12. The Winter 2015/16 Season belonged to our Ladies first team after they Tina Fuselli captained the young side to the Division 1 Surrey Cup title! Two seasons ago we didn’t even have a team so that is a huge achievement.
In addition congratulations to our ladies second team, who won the ladies Surrey Cup Division 3 title
13. In the men’s Winter Surrey Cup season the first team finished in second position narrowly behind Colets.
The men’s second and third teams were both in split Division 3 and it was our third team that won the title in emphatic style. Our second had a strong season too finishing 2nd.
The club’s fourth and fifth teams held their status in Divisions 4 & 6 but unfortunately our sixth team had a tough winter season and are likely to be relegated to Division 7.
14. The club’s junior section is holding firm, with the nucleus of juniors continuing to grow each year. More juniors entered our club championship & are playing more league games to gain match play experiences.
15. The committee have continued to grow the partnership with Roehampton University, allowing their team players the chance to train with our academy & become involved with the squash programme at the club. This partnership also brings in sponsorship & membership to Wimbledon Racquets. We look forward to taking this partnership further over the coming years.
16. We have reviewed all coaching sessions and created a pathway for all standards at the club
Re-alligned leagues so come the club championships we will have a more even distribution of entries across the standards offering more encouragement to all players .
We have also implemented quarterly prizes for the league players to encourage participation.
We have improved the profitability of the section and court utilisation
Individual Squash Achievements 14/15
Lyell Fuller:
· Current World Ranking – 141
Yathreb Adel
· Reached Career High World Ranking No.25 in October 2015
Upcoming agenda action points:
Further social events – Racketlon event
Social doubles evening
Continued Sponsorship and growth
Refereeing course – 16th September
Any questions from the floor ?
I would of course like to thank the individuals on the committee for their continued support throughout the year. For their dedication to the cause of making sure the squash section operates to its maximum potential.
Thank you all for your time.
Unfortunately after years of loyal and dedicated service Jim White has decided to step down. We owe so much to Jim for his tireless efforts over the years he has been a fantastic servant and we will look for an appropriate wayo to recognise this in the forthcoming months.
I would like to nominate the following members for re-election to the committee for 2016/17.
Phil Rushworth, Tina Fuselli and George Maxwell who are club employees and therefore do not require election.
Geoff Chapman, Geoff Mayne, John Cross, Andy Wales, Philip Black, Kelcey Button, John Sawyer, John Maclennan would all like to continue in their roles.
Lewis Crabtree has kindly applied to join the committee and therefore we thank and welcome Lewis to the committee which will therefore remain at capacity of 9.
Unless anyone objects then the names I have just mentioned will form the basis of the Squash committee for 2016/17 and a chair person will be elected at the next meeting on 18th July.