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Sport | Joelle King

Joelle King wins eighth NZ squash title

Joelle King presented with her title (photo: Squash New Zealand)

Joelle King (Ngāti Porou) has returned home over the weekend to take out her eighth national squash title in Auckland.

In the final she defeated second seed Amanda Landers-Murphy from Rotorua 11-2, 11-4, 11-6. King, 30, dominated the match against Landers-Murphy, who struggled to find any rhythm as the top seed kept up the pace of the match and had an answer to anything her opponent hit at her.

King said post match that she was now going to take a little bit more time to relax and look at her future season, before she heads back to her base in the Northern Hemisphere.

In the men’s tournament, New Zealand number one Paul Coll won his fifth title against Campbell Grayson 11-3, 11-7, 11-4.

There were positive signs for the game in New Zealand across the tournament too, with the emergence of several younger professional players such as Lwamba Chileshe. It also saw the return of former pros Megan Craig and Lana Harrison, who made the semi-finals after breaks away to have children.

Both King and Coll are currently ranked sixth in the world in the men’s and women’s rankings.