KARACHI, May 30: Pakistan Squash Federation (PSF) is making efforts to widen the national junior circuit and intends to hold at least eight major youth tournaments all over the country this year, a Pakistan squash Federation (PSF) spokesman said on Friday.

The PSF spokesman said that the federation was looking forward to promote squash among the country’s youth which was the reason why it was taking a lot of interest in holding competitive age group tournaments throughout the year.

The PSF has been organizing two or three junior tournaments, mostly in the up country, during the last few years. The biggest event on the junior circuit has been the Hashim Khan National Championship held annually in Lahore.

Now the PSF has planned to hold similar tournaments in all the major squash centers of the country.

Next month the PSF and the Balochistan Squash Association will join hands to hold a national ranking tournament in Quetta.

Then the leading junior players of the country will assemble in Karachi to participate in the National Junior Championship from July 5 to 10. All the top ranking boys will compete in the event that will carry at stake a handsome prize purse of Rs 300,000.

Then the junior circuit will also take the players to other cities including Lahore, Peshawar and Rawalpindi.

The PSF spokesman said that aim of the federation was to have a full-fledged junior circuit with major tournaments every year.

The target of the PSF is to raise a strong youth squad for the World Junior Championship to be held in Aug 2004 in Karachi or Islamabad.

Pakistan won the world junior team title for the first time in 20 years when they defeated top seeds England in the final of the 2002 edition of the World Junior Championship held in Chennai (India) last December. —PPI