Gregory Gaultier of France (left) hits a shot as Ramy Ashour of Egypt looks on during their semi-final match at the Australian Open squash tournament in Canberra yesterday. Ashour won 7-11, 11-9, 11-9, 11-9

The world’s top two squash players will clash in the final of the season-opening Australian Open in Canberra after Nick Matthew and Ramy Ashour both won their semi-finals yesterday. Englishman Matthew ended Australian David Palmer’s fairytale run with a ruthless 11-9, 11-4, 11-5 win, before Egyptian tyro Ashour downed France’s Gregory Gaultier 7-11, 11-9, 11-9, 11-9 in a match of rare quality. The 35-year-old Palmer has been carrying an ankle injury but has been playing great squash, culminating in a win over world number three Karim Darwish in the quarter-finals. However, despite the vocal support of a large home crowd, the 2008 champion came up short against a player at the peak of his game. “He’s had a good week and he’s come pretty far in the tournament, but I wasn’t going to let him have his fairytale,” Matthew said. “The first game was quite crucial, he started off like a train but once I won the first game I had some breathing space and it was going to be a tough task for him to come back from it.” Ashour and Gaultier renewed their Australian Open rivalry from last year, where they also met in the semi-finals. On that occasion they played one of the best matches ever seen in Australia, and although yesterday’s match may have fallen short of that classic, it still came fairly close. Gaultier had chances to win every game, only to be undone by some sublime stroke play from the audacious Egyptian, who seems able to hit clean winners from any position on the court. “Greg’s as fast as a spaceship, you can see how fast he is on the court, how physically fit he is,” Ashour said. “He’s such a diligent guy, he works very hard and pushes himself on court to his limit—for me to stay on court for that long and keep up gives me a lot of confidence.” The women’s final also features the world numbers one and two, Malaysia’s Nicol David and Englishwoman Jenny Duncalf. David took a step closer to her first Australian Open title when she downed former champion Rachael Grinham 11-7, 13-11, 11-7, while Duncalf beat defending champion Madeline Perry of Ireland 11-8, 11-9, 2-11, 11-4. Grinham had not beaten David since 2007, but she took the game right up to the world number one and had her under enormous pressure at times. However, David was able to stay in the points with some superb defence and lift her game when it counted, winning comfortably in the end.