Squash's Olympic exile, success of 'Old war horses' made headlines in 2013

NEW DELHI: Squash went through the agony of a third Olympic bid rejection but Indian racqueters, led by Dipika Pallikal, continued to take giant strides globally with quite a few international titles coming their way in an eventful 2013.

'Old war horses' - Pallikal, Saurav Ghosal and Joshna Chinappa - kept the tri-colour fluttering in the international squash arena even as a new pedigree of players too complemented the efforts of their senior pros with some inspiring performances on the PSA and WISPA Tour events.

However, the squash fraternity was left heart-broken by the IOC's decision to choose wrestling ahead of squash as an additional sport to join the 2020 Olympic programme.

Wrestling, one of the rare sports which progressed from ancient to modern Olympics, won the voting at the 125th IOC Session in Buenos Aires with 49 of the 95 votes cast. The joint bid of baseball/softball was second with 24 votes and squash received 22.

This was the third consecutive bid by squash to join the Games and journey to get here had been a long one - 10 years in fact - having failed to get the required two-thirds majority in 2005 in Singapore and 2009 in Denmark.

The Indian squash players, however, put behind that disappointment and continued to make their presence felt world over.

Pallikal clinched the prestigious Macau Open title, her seventh WSA title, in October after notching up a stunning victory against former World number one Rachael Grinham of Australia.

The 22-year-old had reached the final after defeating Rachael's younger sister Natalie, a former World No.2 and currently ranked eighth in the WSA rankings.

Pallikal also helped the Indian women's squash team script history in Kuwait by guiding them to their maiden Asian Tour title in May.