History Made As Egyptians Orfi & Zakaria Win World Junior Titles

Egypt's Amina Orfi and Mohamad Zakaria have been crowned the 2025 World Junior Champions after scoring crushing wins over compatriots Nadien Elhammamy and Marwan Asal at Black Ball Sporting Club in Cairo.

The duo have dominated the junior squash circuit in recent years, with Orfi's win making her the first player in history to win the World Junior Championship four times and Zakaria comfortably following up his win last year in Houston when he became the youngest ever male champion at age 16.

Already up to world No.5, Orfi has looked like a generational talent ever since capturing the title for the first time aged just 15 in 2022.

With her win last year in Houston drawing her level with national icon Nour El Sherbini - who was in the Black Ball crowd alongside numerous other legends of Egyptian squash - the 2025 final represented an opportunity for Orfi to go one better and become the outright record holder.

If this caused her to feel any pressure, it certainly didn't show, with Orfi looking composed as she took the first game 11-7.

3/4 seed Elhammamy showed she had the mental strength to beat anyone yesterday when she saved eight game balls in a 3/0 upset over No.2 seed Anahat Singh of India.

Although she never gave up in the finalk, she was unable to counter Orfi's unerring consistency and accuracy, with Orfi doubling her lead with a dominant 11-5 win.

From here, the final result looked to be a foregone conclusion and, try though she might, Elhammamy could not find a way past Orfi's defence, and the top seed sealed her historic fourth title with another 11-5 victory.

"I can't believe it - I've been dreaming about this moment since I was 10 years old. I knew Nour El Sherbini was the only player to have won it three times before and watching her here in the crowd was special,

"I'm over the moon and it's very special for me because it's my home crowd and everyone that I've been playing in front of since I was a very young junior."

In the men's final, Zakaria proved he was a level above his competition as he delivered a completely one-sided 3/0 win over compatriot and 3/4 seed Asal.

Asal had shown promising signs in the first game, but could do little to beat the defences of world No.14 Zakaria, with the reigning champion retrieving excellently and punishing any loose shots to take game one 11-5.

From here, frustration seemed to set in for Asal, with the 17-year-old making several mistakes as Zakaria doubled his lead 11-3.

Game three was more of the same, with Zakaria patient despite rallies often breaking down as the number of collisions increased.

The top seed kept his cool, though, calmly going about his business and bringing the contest to a swift end with an 11-4 victory to extend his record in the World Juniors to 13 wins without a game dropped since the final of the 2023 championship.

Afterwards, Zakaria said: "It feels amazing. To do it in front of my parents and all of these legends [Zakaria and Orfi were joined later on court by some of Egypt's previous champions] in the front row makes it much more memorable. I think I played very well, like I would have wanted, I'm very happy with my performances throughout the week and I'm thankful for my team for sticking with me, my parents and truly this amazing crowd. It's been an amazing week!"

Speaking at the closing ceremony, World Squash President Zena Wooldridge said: "The last few days here we've had a packed audience, so thank you all for supporting the event. It's made the atmosphere fantastic and I don't think there's another nation in the world that could support a World Junior Championship like what you have here. It shows how passionate Egypt is about squash and the number of legends you've had on court today just confirms that.

"This is an amazing venue. I came here in 2022 and had my first tour around this venue and immediately thought this is an amazing venue for a World Championships."