Malaysia In Historic Asian Championships Clean Sweep

Malaysia defeated defending champions Pakistan in the men's final of the Asian Team Championships at the Taipei Arena in Taiwan, Chinese Taipei, to pull off the first clean sweep of all four titles in the 25-year history of the championships.

Last week, Ong Beng Hee and Nicol David successfully defended the individual titles they won two years ago in Kuala Lumpur. Then David, the world champion and world No1, led her country to success in the women's team event, beating Hong Kong in the final.

Pakistan took the early lead in the men's final when fast-improving youngster Farhan Mehboob, a 17-year-old former Asian Junior champion from Peshawar, beat Malaysia's Timothy Arnold 9-1 9-1 9-4 in the opening rubber. But Malaysia's top string Mohd Azlan Iskandar, the world No14 from Sarawak, levelled the tie with a confident 9-2 9-6 9-2 victory over Pakistan's Mansoor Zaman.

It was left to squad No2 Ong Beng Hee to clinch victory for the top seeds, beating Mansoor's cousin Shahid Zaman 9-2, 9-3, 9-3 to secure Malaysia's historic title win.

"The weather may have been wet and dreary but the spirits were surely high and charged," said Asian Squash Federation spokesman Major Maniam. "Overall, it was an extremely successful event - and all credit must go to the Squash Rackets Association of Chinese Taipei who worked extremely hard to put up a splendid show, their first ever Asian Championship."

In the play-off for third place, fourth seeds Kuwait upset India, the third seeds, 2-0. Hosts Chinese Taipei, the 11th seeds making their debut in the event, finished in an impressive ninth place after beating 10th seeds Iran 2-1.

Men's final:
[1] MALAYSIA bt [2] PAKISTAN 2-1 (Timothy Arnold lost to Farhan Mehboob 1-9, 1-9, 4-9; Mohd Azlan Iskandar bt Mansoor Zaman 9-2, 9-6, 9-2; Ong Beng Hee bt Shahid Zaman 9-2, 9-3, 9-3)

3rd place play-off:
[4] KUWAIT bt [3] INDIA 2-0 (Ali Alramezi bt Gaurav Nandrajog 9-1, 9-7, 4-9, 5-9, 9-6; Abdullah Almezayen bt Ritwik Bhattacharya 9-6, 9-6, 9-0; Bader Al Hussaini v Saurav Ghosal (dead rubber - match not played))