Since coronavirus arrived to the United Kingdom it’s had a massive effect on everyones lives. It is also had a massive effect on the participation of sport.
Since lockdown ended most sports have returned back to playing how it is known.
However for the sport of Squash there has been no normality since before the start of the pandemic.
With more than 1500 squash venues across England, players of the sport have had to adapt to new rules and ways of playing the sport so they could comply with Covid secure guidelines.
I met with Durham & Cleveland Squash Association chairman Dave Geldart to speak all things Squash and coronavirus.
” Because squash is indoors and is the most effected by covid-19 we where basically the last sport back online to play even then it was with a lot of restrictions. ”
Once the virus was under control England Squash and the Government allowed squash to make a comeback.
” When squash first came back it was with a lot of resections, no body could play the proper game of squash. ”
With everything since the Pandemic rules have changed in squash.
One of the first steps back was to play sides, this meant two people on the court one at the front of the court and one stood at the back, this would allow the players to keep a rally going while also maintaining a social distance.
After a month England Squash announced ‘Squash bubbles’ this allows people from different households to play a full game of squash. This allowed six people into a bubble so they could play each other, however there was still restrictions in place.
” Only one person could serve, only one person could touch the ball it had to be the same person all the time. You could only play three games to 13 sudden death and then it had to finish. ” Dave’s comments explaining how a squash bubble works.
Following the announcement from Boris Johnson on October 31st all sports have to be paused again for 28 days due to another lockdown in place
Dave is also worried that squash will see another decline in players after the pandemic is over.
” We where struggling as a sport before the pandemic, but after it we I feel we will be struggling a lot more and we will have to rebuild to get the sport up and running again. ”
According to figures from statista.com since 2016 100,000 people have stopped playing squash. This could be even more if the sport is put on hold any longer due to the pandemic.
