India Upset Korea To Reach First World Junior Teams Semi For 13 Years

India produced their best performance of the 2025 World Junior Team Championships so far as the No.5 seeds reached the men's semi-finals for the first time since 2012 after eliminating No.3 seeds and 2024 finalists Republic of Korea at Black Ball Sporting Club in Cairo.

Last year, in Houston, USA, India were defeated by Republic of Korea in a hard-fought three-match quarter-final encounter before the Koreans went on to reach the final for the first time.

To begin their revenge bid, Yusha Nafees gave India a deserved lead when defeating Jeonguk Ryu in straight games.

Last year's individual finalist Jooyoung Na hit back for the No.3 seeds in match two, finally producing his best squash after a mixed campaign as he recorded three consecutive 11-4 wins over Sandhesh Palanivel Ravikumar to take the tie into a decider.

Cheered on by H.E Suresh K Reddy, India's Ambassador to Egypt, Arihant Kalamangalam Sunil was able to deliver the decisive breakthrough, with the 18-year-old fighting his way through an intensely physical 11-7, 11-13, 11-8, 11-7 win over Jonghyeok Lee to send the India bench into raptures.

India will face USA in the semi-final after the No.2 seeds defeated France 2/1, with Jack Elriani and Oscar Okonkwo delivering wins either side of a defeat for Alexander Dartnell against Amir Khaled-Jousselin.

Afterwards, India coach Harinder Pal Sandhu said: "It means a lot for us, but even more for Indian Squash. The SRFI [Squash Racquets Federation of India] and Sports Authority of India have been backing us for so many years and given so much support.

"This has been a long time coming, we were so close last year and that was hurting us all.

"We've been waiting for a year for this and the individual players have taken on the responsibility. They play every match as though it's the decider in the World Juniors, and you're playing for your country."

The other men's semi-final will see old rivals Egypt and England lock swords once again, with top seeds and defending champions Egypt beating No.12 seeds Czech Republic and fourth seeds England beating five-time champions and No.6 seeds Pakistan.

That will be one of two Egypt-England semi-final clashes after the women's sides also set up a last four showdown.

Egypt's women's side, winners of the last nine championships, continued to crush all opposition as they cruised past an India side missing first string Anahat Singh, with Nadien Elhammamy and Amina Orfi crushing Anika Dubey and Unnati Tripathi before Sohayla Hazem beat Navya Sundararajan in the dead rubber.

England, meanwhile, dominated a Canada side to return to the top four after a sixth-place finish last year ended their run of five straight semi-final appearances.

Emily Coulcher-Porter started strongly for England with a 3/1 win over Spring Ma, which was followed by a 3/0 win for Mariam Eissa over Spring's twin sister Ocean Ma. The two sides opted to play the best-of-three dead rubber, with Canada's Tsz Ling Alyssa Ho beating Olivia Owens 2/1.

The other women's semi-final looks set to be a classic as No.2 seeds Hong Kong face No.3 seeds USA.

The US women, finalists last year but with a new-look team this year, were forced to do things the hard way by a stubborn France team.

In the opening tie on the glass court, France's Inès Guyot played her best match of the championship so far to beat Samantha Jaffe, before USA turned the tie around with wins from Jaffe's twin sister, Alexandra Jaffe, and Charlotte Pastel over Lauren Baltayan and Leelou Laporte.

Hong Kong meanwhile, proved far too strong for No.8 seeds Australia, with Ena Kwong easing past Sarbani Maitra 11-3, 11-1, 11-3 and Tsz Ching Cheung beating Joanne Joseph 11-4, 11-1, 11-7.