Daniel Poleshchuk became the first Israeli to win an international PSA recognised tournament after lifting the title in Herzliya.
Having been eliminated at the first-round stage last year, Poleshchuk, an ex-Millfield scholar, demonstrated a dramatic improvement in a high-class 18-man field.
Poleshchuk went into the tournament unseeded, but he overcame the odds, beating 2014 runner-up Christophe Andre of France early on. He followed this with an excellent victory over highly-rated English player Oliver Pett, whom he defeated 3-0, to set up a final against the tournament’s no. 2 seed, and world top 100 player, Geoffrey Demont.
The Frenchman stormed into a 2-0 some 20 minutes Poleshchuk found himself 2-0 down, with the Frenchman playing scintillating squash.
Poleshchuk changed his tactics midway through the third game and confused Demont to level the match.
The Frenchman showed guile and he worked out how to counter Poleshchuk to set up a nail-biting fifth game.
The game swung back and forth, but finally Poleshchuk managed to edge into a 10-8 lead, with two match and championship points in hand.
Demont came back at him, fighting for every shot, until Poleshchuk moved ahead 11-10, with one game-point to win the title. Playing in front of his home crowd, family and friends, he was never going to yield and eventually won 13-11 in a match lasting 88 minutes.
Poleshchuk said: "I’d like to thank my sponsors, Global Relocations Ltd, and the herculean efforts of the volunteers and staff of the Israel Squash Association, including Stan Tannen, for bringing to Israel 18 international players from eight countries, thus putting Israel firmly on the PSA international tour."