ONCE AGAIN the young dynamic squash players from Carlow LTC performed with great intensity, skill and sportsmanship at the Ulster Junior Squash Open held in the heartland of Ulster squash the Belfast Boat Club. Ten players from Carlow town were part of the 90 or so players who competed from ages U11 to U-19 and there is no doubt that Carlow can be very proud of their achievements with 4 players reaching the finals and while Carlow had just one winner in Elaine Ware it was a tremendous performance one and all.

The Girls under 17 title was won in emphatic fashion by Elaine Ware, giving her two Provincial Open titles following the Connacht Open some weeks back.

On Sunday she defeated Jennifer Hegarty from Galway in great style, Elaine in her first two games was simply in a different league to her opponent, she turned the Galway girl with every opportunity, volleyed with ease and continuously forced Hegarty to the front and to the back of court. Hegarty to be fair was competitive and did put some pressure on the Carlow girl in the third where she managed to pull Wares lead back but could not take over.

So a 3/0 win and her 2nd Provincial title for Elaine who performs at optimum level each time she plays. At the moment she looks unstoppable at U-17 level and one wonders how she would fare out if she was playing up at U-19 level.

Shaun Hennessy ranked 5 has been gnawing away like a beaver at the top players for some time and this weekend he succeeded in taking the No2 seed David Ryan in the semifinals. Ryan is a formidable player and he was ranked at No1 U-13 in Europe last season the only Irish Junior ever to reach No1 spot. Hennessy was two games down in semis on Sat and boy did work his body to pull back Ryan to win in the 5th set, he played what was possibly his best squash ever to take the Dubliner here and just when you thought it could not get harder he faced Michael Craig the local hero in the final.

Craig is a fearless competitor, he can cover the court with ease, play equally as strong on both backhand and forehand and is never afraid to go for winners. Sean for two games was able to stay with the Belfast lad but Craig pulled away in the 3rd to take the title.

Carlow's youngest competitor, Casey Luther who just turned 11 on Friday was giving away almost two years to her opponent Róisín Ó Shea from Galway in the U-13 girls final. The Fenagh girl for two games was close to the Galway lass but strength was the difference between the two girls who gave a top class display of competitive squash.

Katelyn Doran and Catherine Abernathy from Belfast were the protagonists in the U-19 girls final and Abernathy was simply too strong for the Carlow girl and won 3/0.

Newcomer to Carlow Ltc Owen O'Donnell was the winner of the U-15 B title putting in two terrific performances against tough Northern opponents. In the U-15A Ryan Luther made the plate final where he met Stephen Quigley form Sligo and looked out of sorts in the early part of the first game but fought really well to come back and keep himself the match. Victory in the end went to the Sligo lad but it could have been Ryans.

Cathal Hennessy had another couple of very tough matches notably against Daniel Estrange Dublin and Pat Murphy Belfast to finish a very good 6th place in U-17 boys event.

This is traditionally one of the most competitive sections and this the UJO was no exception.

Fiona O'Keefe continues to improve with each tournament and finished 6th in the girls U-17 following a great game with Galway's Orna Murray while her sister Niamh in the U-15 girls finished the tournament meeting her club mate Rebecca McDermott and this time Rebecca came out on top winning 3/1 to take 5th place with Niamh 6th.

A notable absentee from the Ulster Junior Open was Seamus Harmon winner of the Connacht Junior Open some weeks ago and such is the mans talent that last week he played for Carlow Town in the County Minor Hurling Final and this week he played for Palatine in the County Minor Football final scoring a very impressive 8 points.

While the Carlow Junior squash players were competing in Finals at the Ulster Junior Open the senior players were competing at the other end of the country in the Munster Senior Squash Open held in Cork and both Arthur Gaskin and Ciara Moloney both reached their respective finals with Ciara winning the Ladies and Arthur runner-up in the A

John Rooney made it four-in-a-row to take the title in Cork beating number two seed Arthur Gaskin in a closely fought final won on a score of 11/6; 11/6; 8/11; 9/11;12/10. Gaskin had two match balls in the fifth. In the Women's A Ciara Moloney beat Clare Jones Cork 3-0.