Anahat Singh rises in squash, defeats champion Nour El Sherbini ahead of Olympic dreams

Anahat Singh is 18. Ahead of her matches, she spends a fair bit of time on choosing her attire and jewellery. She wants the photos to look good. She played piano as a child. She loves to paint horses. She is also a bright student who has been accepted into Harvard University.

Her spot though has been kept on hold for a year because her eyes are set on the Olympic Games in 2028. Anahat is like any other teenager, but isn’t really like any other teenager.

This week, she took yet another gigantic leap in her professional journey.


Read more: Anahat Singh school: India's squash sensation who stunned 8-time world champion Nour ElSherbini is a student of a British school

At the Silicon Valley Open in Redwood City California, Anahat shocked eight-time World Champion and childhood idol Nour El Sherbini in a Round of 16 match. Sherbini, often described as the greatest of all time, has admittedly been in patchy form this year. Yet, for Anahat, the moment felt “unreal” as growing up she had watched “every single match” of the Egyptian legend.

A day later Anahat claimed another huge scalp, winning a fivegame bruiser against another higher ranked Egyptian Salma Hany to qualify for a semifinal of PSA Gold category event for the first time.

The dream run though was interrupted in the last four, with a familiar foe, Malaysia’s Sivasangari Subramaniam, outclassing her in four games. Subramaniam, ranked four in the world, had also shattered Anahat’s dreams of direct qualification for LA 2028 Olympics by beating her in the final of the 2026 Asian Games, but the 27-year-old is in no doubt that the Indian is one of the rising stars of squash.

Read more: Anahat Singh school: India's squash sensation who stunned 8-time world champion Nour ElSherbini is a student of a British school

“Anahat is very talented and so dangerous,” the multiple times winner on the circuit told the PSA website.

“She’s definitely amongst the top girls now, and she’s still so young.” Since winning two bronze medals as a 15-year-old at the 2023 Asian Games, Anahat has grown accustomed to the spotlight. But 2026 has been a breakthrough year.

The Asian Games heroics came on the back of a string of eyecatching performances — defending her Indian Open title in Mumbai, clinching the Squash on Fire Open title in Washington to break into the world’s top 20 as the youngest Asian to achieve the feat, and most impressively, winning the World Junior Championships to end Egypt’s 16-year dominance over that crown.

The squash world has taken notice, not just of the milestones but also of her dazzling playing style. Anahat is instinctively attacking in her methods, using a unique combination of touch, timing and deception to create openings.

Having been drawn to badminton as a six-year-old when watching P V Sindhu has helped her build skills to disguise direction and leave opponents guessing until the last moment. Her backhand is a ferocious weapon, while the variety in her shot-making, along with the accuracy of length and the audacity in her approach make her a compelling player to watch.

“If she continues listen, absorb, put the work in, stay focused, there’s no reason why, at the very least, she is not going to be a mainstay in the top 10 for a considerable period of time,” predicted Saurav Ghosal earlier this year.

Ghosal, who himself cracked the top 10 and mentors Anahat, believes, “She could go higher as well. But the top 10 is like a bare minimum.”

As her career graph rises, Anahat recognises the burden of expectations but is far from overwhelmed. She is aware that the future of Indian squash, in the near to medium term, is now inevitably intertwined with her own success.

Supported by a doting family and a professionally structured coaching set-up behind her, the teenager can now build steadily towards improving her ranking, contending for titles and chasing the ultimate dream — an Olympic medal when squash makes its debut at the 2028 Games. There was enough evidence this week that the journey is on track.