Jan Koukal became only the second player outside the world top ten to celebrate his 40th appearance in a PSA World Tour final when he reached the climax of the Gibraltar Open, the PSA Challenger 5 squash event in its second year at The Squash Centre in Gibraltar.<\/p>\n
And the 30-year-old Czech star celebrated it in fine style, by beating Scotland’s Greg Lobban to win the 23rd Tour title of his career.<\/p>\n
Top seed Koukal reached the final without dropping a game – but took 70 minutes to survive his semi-final against third-seeded Englishman Ben Coleman 12-10, 11-6, 11-8.<\/p>\n
Lobban, the 20-year-old No2 seed from Edinburgh, also overcame an Englishman in the other semi – needing 91 minutes to get the better of fourth seed Declan James 11-6, 5-11, 15-13, 11-5 to reach the third final of his career.\n<\/p>\n
But despite giving ten years to his opponent in the final, Koukal kept his cool to triumph 12-10, 11-9, 12-10 in exactly an hour.<\/p>\n
Koukal, one of the busiest players on the PSA World Tour, competed in 25 events in 2011 and 20 in 2012 – and in Gibraltar was celebrating his 11th event of the year, in the eighth different country.<\/p>\n
RESULTS: PSA Challenger 5 Gibraltar Open, Gibraltar<\/strong><\/p>\n 1st round: Jan Koukal became only the second player outside the world top ten to celebrate his 40th appearance in a PSA World Tour final when he reached the climax of the Gibraltar Open, the PSA Challenger 5 squash event in its second year at The Squash Centre in Gibraltar.<\/p>\n And the 30-year-old Czech star celebrated it in fine style, by beating Scotland’s Greg Lobban to win the 23rd Tour title of his career.<\/p>\n Top seed Koukal reached the final without dropping a game – but took 70 minutes to survive his semi-final against third-seeded Englishman Ben Coleman 12-10, 11-6, 11-8.<\/p>\n Lobban, the 20-year-old No2 seed from Edinburgh, also overcame an Englishman in the other semi – needing 91 minutes to get the better of fourth seed Declan James 11-6, 5-11, 15-13, 11-5 to reach the third final of his career.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15790","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-others"],"yoast_head":"\n
<\/strong>
[1] Jan Koukal (CZE) bt Kevin Moran (SCO) 11-9, 11-7, 11-6 (45m)
[Q] Douglas Kempsell (SCO) bt Ondrej Ertl (CZE) 11-5, 11-6, 11-7 (35m)
Steven London (ENG) bt [WC] Anthony Brindle (GIB) 11-7, 11-3, 11-8 (40m)
[3] Ben Coleman (ENG) bt [Q] Jakob Dirnberger (AUT) 11-8, 11-1, 11-9 (28m)
[4] Declan James (ENG) bt [LL] Roman Svec (CZE) 11-3, 11-3, 11-5 (34m)
Thomas Ford (ENG) bt [Q] Hugo Varela (ESP) 11-6, 11-6, 11-7 (28m)
[Q] Ollie Holland (ENG) bt Michael Harris (ENG) 4-11, 11-3, 11-7, 6-11, 11-8 (71m)
[2] Greg Lobban (SCO) bt Alex Phillips (ENG) 11-4, 11-8, 11-6 (32m)
Quarter-finals:
<\/strong>
[1] Jan Koukal (CZE) bt [Q] Douglas Kempsell (SCO) 11-9, 11-7, 11-9 (54m)
[3] Ben Coleman (ENG) bt Steven London (ENG) 11-7, 11-5, 11-6
[4] Declan James (ENG) bt Thomas Ford (ENG) 11-8, 11-6, 11-7 (57m)
[2] Greg Lobban (SCO) bt [Q] Ollie Holland (ENG) 11-4, 11-6, 11-8 (35m)
Semi-finals:
<\/strong>
[1] Jan Koukal (CZE) bt [3] Ben Coleman (ENG) 12-10, 11-6, 11-8 (70m)
[2] Greg Lobban (SCO) bt [4] Declan James (ENG) 11-6, 5-11, 15-13, 11-5 (91m)
Final:
<\/strong>
[1] Jan Koukal (CZE) bt [2] Greg Lobban (SCO) 12-10, 11-9, 12-10 (60m)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"