The brand-new Squash Doubles Association (SDA) will launch its inaugural 2012-13 Tour in style with all the big guns heading to Baltimore on the second weekend of October for the $20,000 Maryland Club Open. Two-time defending champions Damien Mudge and Ben Gould will be the top seeds, with Manek Mathur and Yvain Badan, who gave Mudge/Gould their only defeat last season en route to winning the Briggs Cup, seeded second. Mudge and Gould will face 2009 U. S. Pro champions Mark Chaloner and Chris Walker in their opening match, with the victor to then face whoever wins between last season’s Cambridge Club Doubles finalists Preston Quick and Matt Jenson and whichever team survives a ferocious qualifying bracket led by the John Russell/John White and Dan Roberts/Graham Bassett tandems.
In the bottom half of the eight-team main draw, first-time partners Paul Price and Clive Leach will take on Jonny Smith and Greg Park, while former mid-2000’s Trinity College teammates Mathur and Badan will take on whoever emerges from the other qualifying playoff, in which Raj Nanda and Bernardo Samper are the highest-seeded duo. This tournament will kick off an active autumn slate, with tour stops to follow in St. Louis, New York and Toronto heading into Thanksgiving.
By Rob Dinerman