The Oak Leaf Sports Complex in Newton Aycliffe was the host to this year's Northern Area Squash Championships in this yearly event, which featured the cream of junior squash players from Cumbria, Northumbria as well as Durham & Cleveland.

The County juniors had a clean sweep of all the boy's events from under-11 to under-19 and the girls only lost two events but in each were runner up.

Saturday's primary rounds featured two matches that stood out for different reasons. Aycliffe's Sarah Dowson avenged a previous County Closed defeat by Norton's Sarah Settersfield in emphatic style. The Aycliffe girl has improved immensely over the last 3 months under the supervision of County coach Bill West and the result was a compelling 3/0 win. Gusiborough's Josh Harris is arguably the most improved County player this season and he had a chance of a major upset in the boys under 15s against club and County teammate Chris Allinson. Nationally ranked Allinson was off his game and making alarming errors in the first 3 games that allowed Harris to capitalise with his exciting style of play but poor temperament throughout the match constantly gave the initiative back to Allinson who kept his composure throughout and his maturity proved to be the deciding factor in an unconvincing 3/1 win.

The boys under 17s event should have been the premier event of the weekend with 3 nationally ranked players all from the region. With Aycliffe's Lee Skinner having to move up an age group and Cumbria's Paul Bell not able to play, the final disappointment was No.1 seed Jamie Douglas from Northumbria pulling out at the last minute to leave a comparatively weak field fighting for the regional title. The eventual winner was Aycliffe's Graham Johnson winning his first Regional title in a hard fought match against Andrew Scott from Darlington. Disappointment also in the under 19 boys event with Jamie's brother Tim Douglas also leaving it to the last day to withdraw leaving an all Durham & Cleveland final with Lee Skinner beating County team mate Nick Pugsley 3/0 in a repeat of the of the County Closed final. Although the result was the same Pugsley changed tactics for this final and played a more patient and controlled game and Skinner was pushed hard all the way in a match that was played in an excellent spirit.

Norton's Daniel Hockborne continued his winning ways by winning the boys under 11s and also the under 13-plate competition. Alex Collins from Nunthorpe was in deadly form in the boys under 13 competition beating no.2 seed Alex Storey in 3 straight games. The best boys final of the weekend was the under 15 final with Darlington's Simon Robinson scoring a first ever win over Chris Allinson. Robinson stormed to a 2/0 lead playing in inspired fashion and it looked curtains for Allinson until Robinson decided to query several perfectly good referring decisions with the match almost won. The experienced Allinson took full advantage of his opponent's loss of concentration and made him pay for his petulance by taking a well-deserved game. A stern talking too from father and Darlington coach Ken Robinson settled his son down and the fourth game was won in convincing fashion with an out of sorts Allinson accepting the defeat with good grace.

Girl power was proved alive and kicking in Durham and Cleveland with the County girls in a menacing mood all weekend. Sarah Dowson continued her pervious days fine form and was unlucky to go down in the under 11 final despite winning the first game. Also playing in the older age group Sarah exceeded all expectations by also making the final of the girls under 13s where she pushed County player Jane Larcombe from Sedgefield all the way to eventually lose out in a hard fought fifth game. With sister Helen Dowson winning the under 11 plate competition over Aycliffe club mate Toni Jones and the brother and sister combination of Alex and Laura Vallis both receiving plate runner up medals the renaissance of Aycliffe squash continues to gather pace at all age groups.

County glamour girls Cheryl Cardy from Chester-le-Street and Nunthorpe's Heather Graham proved they could also both play a mean game of squash giving the packed crowd a fantastic display of controlled aggression. With Heather storming to a 9/1 first game win many would have wilted under the pressure but Cheryl is from a family of strong squash players and she fought back well to take the next 2 games 9/7 and 9/5. It was Heather's turn to fight back in the fourth game with Cheryl losing both concentration and the game to set up a blistering fifth and deciding game. It was hard to pick a winner but Heather managed to just clinch the last game 9/7 to claim the under 15 regional title and both girls deserve much credit for producing the best girls match of the weekend.

Durham and Cleveland took the girls under 17s final with County Champion Laura Setterfield destroying Northumbria's Rebecca Brown in a one sided affair. Brown had looked impressive in last weekends Northumbria Open and had give the Norton teenager a hard match, but the return was disappointing with Laura completely overpowering her Nothumbrian opponent.

The pro-active approach to junior squash from Great Aycliffe Town Council as well as both Sedgefield Borough and Durham County Council's has worked in partnership with coaches Bill West and Malcolm Mills to produce a major resurgence of Durham and Cleveland junior squash over their northern neighbours with countless exciting junior players at all age groups. The only disappointment on the horizon for the juniors is the likely scrapping of the traditional Notts/Leicester friendly in January due to lack of financial support from the County senior committee. The raising of £120 for the County juniors rounded off a fantastic weekend at the Oak Leaf for all the victorious Durham and Cleveland players. Many thanks for their generosity for donating raffle prizes go to UNSQUASHABLE and Eric Gates from Century Radio's three legends programme for the donation of a signed football.