Peru’s World No.2 Diego Elias has been named as the top seed for the Canadian Open presented by AirSprint Private Aviation as the PSA World Tour heads back to Calgary for the Silver-level event.
The event will run between March 3-7 with an all-glass court being erected in Oxford Properties’ Bow Valley Square with action available to watch live on SQUASHTV.
Former World No.1 Elias claimed his first title of the season over the weekend as he defended his Motor City Open trophy in emphatic fashion, beating in-form Paul Coll in three games to lift the trophy. The Peruvian will be hoping to claim another World Tour title as he competes in Canada for the first time since 2019, a country where he has tasted victory twice before.
The No.2 seed for the event is Egypt’s Mazen Hesham. The entertaining World No.7 has only failed to reach the quarter-finals in one event so far this season and has been showing impressive consistency. The 29-year-old recently finished second at the Florida Open Gold-level event but will be determined to go one better to claim a ninth career title. He will face the winner of Abhay Sigh and Dimitri Steinmann in round two after a round one bye.
The No.3 and 4 seeding positions are occupied by Marwan ElShorbagy and Youssef Soliman. ElShorbagy will be competing in Canada for the first time since 2019, looking to continue the good form that he was showing at the latter stages of 2023. Soliman on the other hand, started his 2023-24 season in Canada, at the Windsor Cup Bronze-level event, where he lost out to compatriot Tarek Momen in the final. He’ll be hoping to cause an upset against Hesham, if the seedings go to plan, to reach another final in North America.
A trio of Europeans feature in the 5/8 seeding positions as France’s Gregoire Marche and Auguste Dussourd are joined by Switzerland’s Nicolas Mueller and Qatar’s Abdulla Al Tamimi. The quartet will be hopeful of not just achieving their seeding, but causing a quarter-final upset to move into the final four.
One of last year’s wildcards Connor Turk will be back in action this year after he won a wildcard playoff to earn a return to the event in 2024. Turk is currently ranked No.156 and will be hoping to draw on the home support to move into round two. He faces Japan’s Ryunosuke Tsukue in the opening round.
Tickets for the event are available to purchase here.
For more information on the Canadian Open, visit the tournament website or follow the PSA on X, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube.
Draw: Canadian Open 2024 presented by AirSprint Private Aviation
[1] Diego Elias (PER) bye
Yannick Wilhelmi (SUI) v [9/16] Todd Harrity (USA)
[9/16] Ryunosuke Tsukue (JPN) v Connor Turk (CAN)
[8] Gregoire Marche (FRA) bye
[5] Abdulla Al-Tamimi (QAT) bye
Mazen Gamal (EGY) v [9/16] Rui Soares (POR)
[9/16] Farkas Balazs (HUN) v Daniel Poleshchuk (ISR)
[3] Marwan Elshorbagy (ENG) bye
[4] Youssef Soliman (EGY) bye
Tayyab Aslam (PAK) v [9/16] Juan Camilo Vargas (COL)
[9/16] David Baillargeon (CAN) v Ben Smith (ENG)
[6] Nicolas Mueller (SUI) bye
[7] Auguste Dussourd (FRA) bye
Tom Walsh (ENG) v [9/16] Nick Wall (ENG)
[9/16] Dimitri Steinmann (SUI) v Abhay Singh (IND)
[2] Mazen Hesham (EGY) bye
