Can squash ever rise to be a spectator sport?
Willstrop is at the end of his illustrious career, and earlier in 2018, wrote a very thought-provoking article using data to demonstrate the physical demands of squash on the players. An excerpt from his article:
Data from Tarek Momen’s first-round match against Mathieu Castagnet at the Swedish Open earlier this year offers some insight — and an intriguing comparison with tennis. Momen won the 97-minute match but not before he had covered 5km on the court, struck the ball almost 1,000 times, contested 100 points and covered an average of 48 metres per point. Most of his movement consisted of three-six meter sprints, almost half of which were backwards. Momen spent over 60% of the match — more than an hour — in play.
The article then goes on to compare squash favorably to tennis in terms of physical workload. Willstrop also does a great job of exploring why some sports break into the echelon of human and cultural mass acceptance, while others, like squash are still trying to find their way.
What a fantastic article! But I must admit that upon first reading, Momen’s single match coverage of 5km didn’t seem like a lot for a pro athlete, but as James points out, it includes all of those sprints, deep lunges and pushbacks, racket-wielding, body rotations and minimal rest between a set of those actions. That being said, even after looking at the data (and I am a data nerd), I have no idea about how hard the players are working, or how difficult the sport is in real human terms.
A few months ago, I was fortunate to witness another great showing of squash at the annual NetSuite Open, here in San Francisco. One of my friends, who played squash in his teens but not since the last 10 yrs, accompanied me to witness the world’s top players battle it out. We had excellent seats, right behind the referee. Needless to say, we had a great view of the action, mere feet away from some of the best squash in the world.
Despite the VIP-like seats courtesy of another great benefactor of the sport, after a little while, my friend was visibly bored. I must admit that I too was getting a tiny bit done. While we enjoyed the athleticism, my friend correctly pointed out that as a spectator, besides knowing the score, he had no idea what else was special about the game we were watching. I mean he enjoyed the high level of squash, but what particularly was so high level about it?
Was it the best game of squash ever played?
Were the players hitting the ball hardest they had ever hit? Softer than they usually hit?
Was the ball closer to the side wall than any previous game played? Was it in the 99th percentile? 95th?
Were the players covering more ground than they usually do? Was one player working harder than the other? Was any of the players at their fittest? Or best form? Or poorest?
Was there any way to judge the quality of the game besides appreciating the movement and the development of the point?
Was there any target for a young kid to aim for, practice and resolve to achieve in a measurable way?
Sadly, the answer to all of these, and many other questions, was a resounding NO. The reality is that true fans argue endlessly about statistics in a sport, almost with a religious fervor. This is true for sports that have mass following like baseball and cricket, but also true for golf. Even sailing had more statistics than the amazing match we witnessed.
In the same article, James goes on to explore why a sport or a ritual enters the cultural lexicon and becomes part of the shared human experience. He is spot on about where squash needs to be before it can be enjoyed by non-players and casual players. He is right that inclusion of the sport in the Olympics will give it media visibility, and I hope, like him, that this visibility will give squash the boost that it needs to be a true spectator sport.
However, squash is widely considered, for good reason, an elitist sport. It is played in the top Ivy league colleges and enjoys a reputation similar to that of Lacrosse. Facilities are scarce in most parts of the world (with the exception of England and a few commonwealth countries, India notwithstanding), and in general, very expensive to join. Badminton courts, by the same account, are plentiful. Growing up in Bombay (one of India’s top cities and most plentiful in terms of facilities), I had never even heard of squash except the yearly mention of Jahangir or Jansher Khan in the news. I chose Badminton because there were cheap places to play near my home. I only fell in love with squash when I walked into the squash club in Seattle and came face to face with Yusuf Khan on the first day.
The feeling of elitism is not without its benefits. The community is a lot stronger as a function of being small. It’s very easy to walk into a squash club anywhere in the world, and after a few pleasantries, to find common threads of top pros, coaches, or players at common clubs. People are warm towards each other and there is a kinship and brotherhood that is felt only by a minority group with a shared identity.
Besides, who doesn’t want to feel like belonging to an elitist club? At the same NetSuite Open championship event with my friend, there was an open bar serving tastings of Highland Park and Macallan cask-strength whiskeys. Far from accessible and elitist to the core.
PSA is doing some marvelous things with Squash TV and using technology to bring the game of squash to the viewer. However, most efforts are still targeted towards the squash enthusiast/player. Addition of the side camera and the heart rate monitor are great, but fall short of what’s needed to take the spectator into the world of professional sports and make them feel like they are right there.
To truly share the wonder of squash, both as a player and a spectator, the squash community needs to look hard at other ways to bring some key statistics to the watching experience. But, more importantly, we need to open up the game to the middle class in a bigger way and not just allow a few to trickle in to experience the amazement along with the rest who somehow made it.
