SQUASH - Stunning win puts Kitchen in Top 10

A stunning win over the world No.1 sent Northland squash princess Shelley Kitchen into the quarter finals of the world squash championships in Madrid today, but may yet catapult the three-time New Zealand champion into the world top five.
Kitchen beat Australian Nicol David, the highest profile woman player in the history of the game, in a five-set thriller yesterday and was due to meet Natalie Grainger, the former world number one from the United States in a quarter final today.
But regardless of the result today, Kitchen's giant killing effort yesterday is set to boost her ranking back into the top 10 and possibly as high as No.5.
Having worked her way through a solid series of tournaments in America and Canada in preparation for the tournament in Madrid, Kitchen is now in top form heading into the business end of the world championships.
Yesterday Kitchen's never-say-die attitude extinguished David's hopes of a hat-trick of world titles and set the rest of the tournament on notice.
It was the first time since April 2004 and in 36 events that David had failed to reach the quarter finals of a women's tour event
The world number one, who is based in Malaysia, lost 9-0, 9-1, 2-9, 3-9, 9-6 to Kitchen, the 10th seed in Madrid, which followed David's stunning five-game loss from match point up in the fourth game against Rachael Grinham in the British Open final in Manchester last month.
But whereas the Australian recovered from two games down on that occasion, the New Zealander won by frustrating a tremendous comeback by David from a similar deficit.
It was a thrillingly up-and-down match. The champion was rocked by Kitchen's early blitzkrieg attack, became edgy in the second game, but survived long enough in the third to prosper as the storm blew itself out, advancing steadily to a 5-0 lead in the fifth game - and then faltered.
David suggested that the hot and bouncy courts - used for the first three days before the tournament moves today to the open air show-court in front of the Royal Palace - were a factor in the protracted nature of a 69-minute contest full of tortuous rallies.
Kitchen agreed that the conditions suited her.
"I just wanted to stop her volleying and I did that," Kitchen said.
``And I could feel the momentum shift back to me at the end. But I'm speechless frankly. It's hard to believe.'
The Grinham sisters, either Natalie, the second-seeded Commonwealth champion, or Rachael, are now being touted as title favourites.