Peter Nicol, Jonathon Power, Jansher Khan, Simon Parke—those are just some of the names that will be eligible to play in the recently announced Legends of Squash Tour. Kicked off by an exhibition match between Nicol and Power at the J.P. Morgan Tournament of Champions in New York, the objective of the Legends Tour is “to allow great champions to still be able to compete at the highest level, in a mixture of entertaining and serious competitive squash,” said Nicol at a meeting with the media the day after their exhibition match.
Similar in design to the ATP Champions Tour—the tennis version of a legends tour that has been around since the late 1990s—retired players from the PSA tour who have been finalists in the World Open, Tournament of Champions or British Open, or been ranked World No. 1, or played for a winning team in a World Team Championship, will be eligible to play.
Which effectively opens up the possibility of seeing the likes of Rodney Eyles, or Peter Marshall, or Ahmed Barada and a number of other all-time greats.
But before you roll your eyes, expecting to see a bunch of guys struggling to run around the court with diminishing skills, the two-game exo between Nicol and Power showed the potential of the Legends Tour. True, both players had to catch their breath on more than one occasion, but the phenomenal shot-making talent of Power and relentless pressure of Nicol was on full display.
While specifics are still being worked out, the expectation is that Legends tournaments can be run alongside PSA tournaments or as stand alone events. The brainchild of Event Engine (John Nimick) and Peter Nicol (Eventis), events are already confirmed for the UK and the US.
For more info, visit www.LegendsOfSquash.com.
