Seeds Survive First Hurdles In Maiden PSA Event In Ukraine

All top 16 seeds safely came through the first round of the $10,000 Zenit Black Sea Open at the Fitness Club Forma in Odessa, the first PSA Tour squash event to be held in Ukraine.

Ukraine qualifier Artem Shandybin put up the bravest resistance amongst the nine local players battling to claim a place in the second round. The 28-year-old, who has represented his country in the last four European Team Championships, extended tenth seed Issa Kamara to four games - but eventually went down 13-11, 11-8, 7-11, 11-9 to the 30-year-old from Sierra Leone after 50 minutes.

Unseeded Englishman Olivier Pett took the opening game against ninth seed Henrik Mustonen, but the Finn came flying back to win 8-11, 11-8, 11-5, 11-6.

Germany's No2 seed Simon Rosner took just 20 minutes to down Ukrainian Kostyantyn Rybalchenko 11-9, 11-4, 11-7 and will now face Englishman Joel Hinds for a place in the quarter-finals. Hinds, the 14th seed, earned his place in the second round with the minimum effort after being given a walkover by Ukraine's Dmytro Scherbakov. The 32-year-old from Kiev injured his back in his earlier successful qualifying bid.

1st round:
[1] Chris Ryder (ENG) bt Alexandre Benassi (BEL) 11-4, 11-2, 11-5 (35m)
[11] Omar Abdel Meguid (EGY) bt Ido Avron (ISR) 11-5, 11-2, 11-4 (25m)
[5] Jens Schoor (GER) bye
[12] Basem Makram (EGY) bt Florent Pontiere (FRA) 8-11, 11-7, 13-11, 11-3 (45m)
[4] Stephane Galifi (FRA) bt Ali Miski (LIB) 11-13, 11-0, 11-3, 11-4 (35m)
[13] Alexei Severinov (RUS) bt [Q] Konstantin Reshetniak (UKR) 11-4, 11-4, 11-6 (17m)
[8] Neil Hitchens (ENG) bt [Q] Valeriy Fedoruk (UKR) 11-1, 11-2, 11-1 (20m)
[16] Nasser B Al-Ramzi (KUW) bt [Q] Rusian Sorochynskvi (UKR) 11-4, 11-5, 11-2 (25m)
[15] Adam Fuller (ENG) bt [Q] Andrey Kachanyuk (UKR) 11-4, 11-7, 11-5 (15m)
[7] Rasmus Nielsen (DEN) bt Ammar Al-Tamimi (KUW) 11-6, 11-2, 11-7 (35m)
[10] Issa Kamara (SLE) bt [Q] Artem Shandybin (UKR) 13-11, 11-8, 7-11, 11-9 (50m)
[3] Amr Swelim (ITA) bt [Q] Roman Dolynych (UKR) 11-0, 11-6, 11-3 (12m)
[9] Henrik Mustonen (FIN) bt Olivier Pett (ENG) 8-11, 11-8, 11-5, 11-6 (47m)
[6] Andrew McDougall (CAN) bt [Q] Evgeniy Korolenko (UKR) 11-1, 11-4, 11-6 (20m)
[14] Joel Hinds (ENG) bt [Q] Dmytro Scherbakov (UKR) w/o
[2] Simon Rosner (GER) bt Kostyantyn Rybalchenko (UKR) 11-9, 11-4, 11-7 (20m)