World No.6 Sivasangari Subramaniam has captured the second gold-level title of her career at the Squash Australian Open after defeating No.7 seed Marina Stefanoniin straight games at South Bank Piazza in Brisbane. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The men’s title went to World No.2 Paul Coll, who lifted his second Australian Open title after overcoming World No.6 Joel Makin in a brutal 90-minute three-game encounter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Top seed Sivasangari ended the giant-killing run of the World No.19 Stefanoni with a commanding 11-7, 11-4, 11-8 victory for the women’s title after just 28 minutes of play.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Playing in her maiden Gold-level final on the PSA Squash Tour, American Stefanoni looked to be feeling the nerves early on in the first game, with Malaysian No.1 Sivasangari racing into a quick-fire 6-1 lead with some accurate, attacking play.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Stefanoni managed to build her way into the opening game after the slow start, reducing the deficit to 8-7, but it was Sivasangari who remained composed to rattle off three straight points and move into a 1-0 lead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Another rapid start from Sivasangari set her on course to double her advantage in double-quick time, opening up a 6-0 lead and not allowing Stefanoni a route back in. The Malaysian\u2019s smart use of angles and hold constantly had Stefanoni on the back foot, and the former moved to within a game of the title 11-4.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What seemed moments later, Sivasangari had six championship balls on her racket, but it was at this moment that Stefanoni finally found her range at the front of the court, firing in four clean winners to send nerves through the top seed\u2019s camp and sit just two points off her at 10-8 down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, Sivasangari remained calm amid the late Stefanoni resurgence to claim her first title of the 2025\/26 PSA Squash Tour season and the 16th of her career.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After the match, Sivasangari said: \u201cYeah, I\u2019m really happy with how I played. Obviously, I came in as the No.1 seed, which rarely happens at a Gold event. I guess there was a bit more pressure on me compared to the other girls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI just tried to stay as composed as I could this week. I enjoyed it \u2013 I was just trying to focus on my squash and I\u2019m really happy to have won this event.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cYesterday\u2019s match with Nele [Gilis] was pretty long, so I got used to the court then. It helped me get a quick start today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhen I won the London Classic, I beat all the top girls, and I felt like Marina was doing the same thing this week, upsetting all the players. She\u2019s a great fighter and a great player, but I just tried to focus on myself.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meanwhile. despite the three-game scoreline, the men’s final was anything but straightforward for Coll, with the Kiwi No.1 eventually prevailing by a 19-17, 11-4, 14-12 scoreline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Coll and Makin came into the men\u2019s title decider in starkly contrasting circumstances. Makin had spent 107 minutes on court getting past Mohamad Zakaria in their epic semi-final clash \u2013 over twice as long as Coll took to dispatch Jonah Bryant earlier on Saturday evening. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, there were few signs of fatigue from Makin early on as he and Coll slugged out a seismic 44-minute opening game. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
British National Champion Makin took full advantage of a scrappy start from Coll, in which the Kiwi No.1 gave away three consecutive strokes in the mid phases, to move 10-7 up. However, it was from here that the real drama started. Kiwi No.1 Coll regained his accuracy to reel in all three game balls with some brilliant composure before entering a mammoth tie-break, which saw both players spurn opportunities to take a 1-0 lead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The match referee was brought into question 16 times throughout the opening game, as the clock ticked over the 30, 35 and then 40-minute mark. However, it was eventually Coll who took the seismic opener by a 19-17 scoreline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The psychological boost of saving seven game balls before stealing the opening game only gave Coll more confidence in his game at the start of the second game. Top seed Coll had soon after doubled his advantage in the match by an 11-3 scoreline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At 10-6 down in the subsequent third game, Makin looked to be staring down the barrel of defeat, but the Welshman showed incredible grit and determination to save all four championship balls and force the third into a tie-break. Makin then saw two of his own game balls come and go, before Coll finally wrapped up the epic win 14-12 after 90 minutes of play.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After the match, Coll said: \u201cIt was an unbelievable battle. I didn\u2019t even care about what he had yesterday; he\u2019s just so tough, and I knew he was going to come out hard. I thought I played well, but I just let it be sloppy in a couple of patches, at 10-6 in the third.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI respect Joel so much for his professionalism and the way he trains like a beast. It\u2019s always fun playing him and it\u2019s always a great battle when we get out on court.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Men’s: <\/strong>[1] Paul Coll (NZL) bt [2] Joel Makin (WAL) 3-0: 19-17, 11-4, 14-12 (90m)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Women’s: <\/strong>[1] Sivasangari Subramaniam (MAS) bt [7] Marina Stefanoni (USA) 3-0: 11-7, 11-4, 11-8 (28m)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" World No.6 Sivasangari Subramaniam has captured the second gold-level title of her career at the Squash Australian Open<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10604,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[37],"class_list":["post-10603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsbeat","tag-squash"],"aioseo_notices":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Sivasangari-Subramaniam-MAS-v-Marina-Stefanoni-USA_RGPM61181-scaled-1.jpg",2560,1707,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Sivasangari-Subramaniam-MAS-v-Marina-Stefanoni-USA_RGPM61181-scaled-1-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Sivasangari-Subramaniam-MAS-v-Marina-Stefanoni-USA_RGPM61181-scaled-1-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Sivasangari-Subramaniam-MAS-v-Marina-Stefanoni-USA_RGPM61181-scaled-1-768x512.jpg",640,427,true],"large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Sivasangari-Subramaniam-MAS-v-Marina-Stefanoni-USA_RGPM61181-scaled-1-1024x683.jpg",640,427,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Sivasangari-Subramaniam-MAS-v-Marina-Stefanoni-USA_RGPM61181-scaled-1-1536x1024.jpg",1536,1024,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Sivasangari-Subramaniam-MAS-v-Marina-Stefanoni-USA_RGPM61181-scaled-1-2048x1366.jpg",2048,1366,true],"morenews-large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Sivasangari-Subramaniam-MAS-v-Marina-Stefanoni-USA_RGPM61181-scaled-1-825x575.jpg",825,575,true],"morenews-medium":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Sivasangari-Subramaniam-MAS-v-Marina-Stefanoni-USA_RGPM61181-scaled-1-590x410.jpg",590,410,true]},"author_info":{"info":["admin"]},"category_info":"Newsbeat<\/a>","tag_info":"Newsbeat","comment_count":"0","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Sivasangari-Subramaniam-MAS-v-Marina-Stefanoni-USA_RGPM61181-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10603"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10603\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10605,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10603\/revisions\/10605"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}