Following two Under 21 category bronze medals earlier this year at the World Racketlon Team and Doubles Championships in Milan, 16-year-old Josh Kashdan from Avon took part in the World Individual Racketlon Championships 2011 in Vienna, Austria in November.
In the Under 16 event unseeded Josh won through his first two rounds (including a straightforward victory over the No.3 seed) to set up a semi-final against the World No.1, Kris Krawcevicz from Austria. After a terrific start with a 21-5 win in the table tennis, and only a narrow 17-21 loss in the badminton, Josh unfortunately lost 7-21 in the squash - a sport he has only started playing this year. At only 2 points behind, Josh was confident going into the tennis, arguably his strongest sport. Although Josh led 11-9 when they changed ends, he eventually succumbed 17-20 to lose the match by 5 points. Josh had not expected to come up against the No.7 ranked tennis junior in Austria (and World ranked No.47 in this age group) but still came pretty close to causing an upset! Indeed the final was not a close match and the World No.1 took Gold. Josh collected another Bronze medal (his opponent in the play-off being forced to retire due to injury).
In the Under 21 event Josh had a difficult draw against the World No.3, again from Austria, in the first round of 16 but again narrowly lost by 5 points despite reaching 17-3 up in the final discipline of tennis (due to another heavy loss in squash). Josh won his remaining two matches in the consolation event and will hope for a better draw in future years as he moves into this age group. Josh intends to focus on learning more squash quickly and if successful he should have a bright international future in this emerging combination sport.
Josh would like to thank St. Laurence School in Bradford-on-Avon and John Moore Sports of Bath for their support.