Liverpool Squash Venue Hailed As One Of The World's Best

Liverpool's St George's Hall has been hailed as one of the top venues in world squash.

The accolade comes from players who competed in the inaugural Liverpool 08 Open at the landmark city centre venue in May.

Australia's Joseph Kneipp, who is based in Amsterdam, said St George's Hall compared favourably with American venues such as Grand Central Station in New York and Boston Symphony Hall.

Kneipp, who writes a column for the American website SquashTalk (www.squashtalk.com) was full of praise for an event which was the biggest squash tournament to be held in Europe for five years.

He wrote: "Promoter Alan Thatcher of Squash UK may have found the most beautiful squash venue of them all.

"Grand Central Station, the old Stock Exchange building in Antwerp and the Boston Symphony Hall are the most amazing venues I have seen, but for actual beauty of surroundings I think St George's Hall beats them all."

Kneipp also added a historical footnote for his readers, writing: "The building is more than 150 years old and was used for a fund-raising event during the American Civil War.

"Liverpool was described as possibly the most pro-confederate city in England, and in 1864 St George's Hall was the venue for a Confederate Bazaar in aid of the Southern Prisoners Relief Fund."

Kneipp was not the only player to offer rave reviews of the host venue. England's No2 seed James Willstrop added: "St George's Hall is a simply awesome building and we are so lucky in squash to be able to hold tournaments in such amazing surroundings.

"The atmosphere was tremendous during the finals weekend and it was great to see the place looking packed in the first year of the tournament."

Sadly, the 6ft 5in Willstrop suffered a shock quarter-final defeat to Egypt's Karim Darwish, but stayed in Liverpool to join the commentary team who produced two days of dramatic live coverage on Sky Sports.

He also joined England team-mate Lee Beachill on stage singing and playing guitar with rock band Lost For Words during the tournament party, with Beachill performing less than two hours after competing in the semi-final against Australia's David Palmer.
The top seed from New South Wales looked to be heading for an easy victory in the final as he led Thierry Lincou by two games to love, but the fighting Frenchman produced an astonishing recovery to clinch victory in a brutal battle that lasted 83 minutes.

Promoter Alan Thatcher was delighted with the TV coverage and said: "The final was so tense and exciting that Sky extended the programme to show the whole match, which was a huge mark of respect for the sport.

"We were indebted to Liverpool Culture Company for their generous sponsorship and we hope to be back next year with an even bigger and better tournament.

"Our ambition is to turn the Liverpool 08 Open into one of the major events on the world squash calendar and I think we went a long way towards achieving that goal in our first year.

"Everybody connected with the tournament received a warm welcome on Merseyside and we can't wait to get cracking on next year's event."

Thatcher has registered provisional dates of May 12-20 for the 2007 tournament and is also extending the Merseyside Squash Festival to roll out throughout the whole North West region.

He added: "We have some exciting plans for developing the Festival and we aim to run the programme throughout the whole of next season.

"Once again, we will offer local club players of all ages and abilities the opportunity to play their festival finals on the glass court and rub shoulders with the world's greatest players.

"We are also planning some major grass-root development projects which we will be launching in conjunction with England Squash."