Toor ditches training camp for Malaysia

Top squash player Maria Toor pulls out of the second phase of the PSF training camp for the Asian Games.

KARACHI: Pakistan’s top squash player Maria Toor has pulled out of the second phase of the Pakistan Squash Federation’s (PSF) training camp for the 2010 Asian Games and has instead opted to train in Malaysia.

Toor was part of the six-member Games squad that included Zoya Khalid, Muqaddas Ashraf, Saima Shoukat, Roshna Mehboob and Riffat Khan and trained in Abbottabad for two months. However, Toor had left for Kuala Lumpur on Friday without informing the PSF, a move that clearly upset the federation.

The move, according to Toor, was to improve her training for the Asian Games as well as her fitness levels as she will practice with Malaysia’s world number two Sharon Wee. Toor had sought permission from the Malaysian Squash Federation and will return to Pakistan on November 7 to join the squad that departs for China the following day.

“I used to have three matches everyday against my squad-mates and I’d beat them in less then 30 minutes,” the 20-year-old Toor, who leapt 13 places to 72 in the world rankings this year,  told The Express Tribune. “I felt there was no competition between me and the rest and I wasn’t improving as a player.”

While Toor took a personal decision, the PSF Secretary Irfan Asghar Ali felt that it was disrespectful of the Peshawar-born player to have walked out and her attitude had been extremely unprofessional.

“The PSF has been providing the players with the best facilities and this year we even took the initiative of holding the women’s camp for two months,” said Ali. “Otherwise, the camp would never last more than a week.”

Commenting on her move, Toor’s coach, Fahim Gul reckoned that her absence from the camp will disrupt the camp and will affect the performance of the squad in the Asian Games. However, Gul agreed with Toor’s arguments regarding the lack of competition and that she was “naturally blessed with a strong build” and he had to get “different boys to play against her”.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 22^nd, 2010.