England Win Silver at European U19 Mixed Team Championships

England were silver medallists at the European U19 Mixed Team Squash Championships in Prague after narrowly losing the final to defending champions France.

England had won 35 out of 39 editions of the Mixed Team event since it began in 1983, but went into this year's championship as second seeds. However, this year's new format, with two boys and two girls in each team, gave them a good chance to regain the trophy due to their greater strength in depth.

The final began with Dylan Roberts taking on Amir Khaled-Jousselin, who won last week's European U19 Individual title. The 16-year-old from Nancy won 11-3 11-4 11-3 to give France a commanding start.

Mariam Eissa then came up against newly-crowned European U19 champion Lauren Baltayan, who is already an established member of France's senior squad. Although the Frenchwoman won 12-14 11-6 11-6 11-4, Eissa taking the first game on a tiebreak gave England a foothold in the match.

Emily Coulcher-Porter began the England fightback with a straight-games victory over Ines Guyot in the third rubber. The Buckinghamshire player was full of confidence after winning silver in the individual event last week.

Heading into the final match, England knew that a straight-games victory for Ismail Khalil would win them the trophy. Unfortunately, he fell just short, crucially dropping the second game en route to a 11-6 6-11 11-4 12-10 victory.

The match had finished 2-2 in rubbers, 7-7 in games, but France triumphed 134-114 on points countback.

To get to the final, England had finished top of their pool courtesy of victories over Wales, Norway and Switzerland, then conquered the Netherlands 3-1 in the quarter-finals and hosts Czech Republic 3-0 in the semis.

After the final, England coach Tim Vail reflected:

"The new format this year suited us and I'm proud that we ran them so close. We weren't expected to win in the first place. We were the second seeds. But we will come back next year and try to regain the trophy."

"Amir was too good on the day, then Mariam did really well against Lauren. Emily's was a close battle and although Ismail started off well, he lost a bit of focus in the second game.

"We were never going to win on points countback, because of how Amir played against Dylan. He put so many points on the board and we had only 11 at that stage. It's a big deficit to come back from.

"Once Emily won 3-0 it was game on, but that put a lot of pressure on Ismail to win in straight games and unfortunately we couldn't quite get over the line."

In the European U19 Individual Championships, which took place before the Mixed Team event at the same venue, Coulcher-Porter won silver in the women's event.

The Buckinghamshire player, whose distinctive 'hand-swapping' technique allows her to play forehands on both sides of the court, had battled her way past three higher-seeded players to earn a final appearance against France's top seed Baltayan.

Coulcher-Porter [13/16] got past 3/4 seed Renske Huntelaar in four games in round three, conquered her compatriot Olivia Owens [9/12] in the quarter-finals and second seed Maya Weishar of Germany in the semis.

But Cairo-born Baltayan, 17, who lost in last year's final against England's Amelie Haworth, showed all her hard-hitting, street fighting qualities and never allowed the Englishwoman to settle, winning 11-5 11-3 11-4 in 24 minutes.

France won a double in the Individual event as Khaled-Jousselin took the men's title, beating Belgium's Maddox Moxham. Khaled-Jousselin, 16, beat England's 3/4 seed Alex Broadbridge in the semi-finals in straight games.