THERE is nobody hoping that the saying ‘third time lucky’ is accurate more than Alan Clyne. Scotland’s top squash player has finished in the worst possible position in the last two Commonwealth Games: fourth.
The 31 year-old lost out on bronze medals in the men’s doubles at both Delhi 2010 and Glasgow 2014 but the announcement today of the first two squash players selected for Team Scotland for Gold Coast 2018 ensures that Clyne will have another opportunity to finally claim some Commonwealth Games silverware.
“Coming fourth twice in a row has been a bit of a killer,” he told Herald Sport. “At my first Games in 2010, we produced a really big win in the quarter-finals so although were disappointed to lose out on a medal, we felt ok about things because really, we’d over-achieved in reaching the semi-finals.
“In Glasgow however, the big goal had been getting on the podium and in the bronze medal play-off, we really felt like we had a good chance so it was disappointing to lose out. Fourth is really not a great position to finish – we were pretty down for a while but it does make you realise how much you really want it. It drives me on to make sure I don’t have that feeling again and it definitely gives me an extra push.”
Clyne is in confident mood, and rightly so. 2017 has seen the Inverness-born player in the form of his life and after claiming his seventh Scottish national title earlier this year, he has seen his world ranking rise to a record high of 24 earlier this month. This improvement has, in part, been as a result of some technical changes he has made to his game but the biggest change has been in his mindset. “I’ve made some psychological changes,” he said.
“A lot of the time there’s not a huge difference between the top players so it’s just about actually getting the wins rather than losing close matches. I work with a psychologist and so now, I’m using a few mental trick on court - I write things on my hand to help me refocus and I feel like that’s made a difference to me during tight matches.”
While Clyne’s singles is going from strength-to-strength, the doubles gives him, alongside Lobban, perhaps an even better opportunity to grab a medal in Gold Coast. In their first tournament together in 2016, the pair took everyone by surprise by claiming victory in the prestigious World Doubles Championships before following that up this year with another impressive result, taking silver.
Their form has given Clyne the belief that they have beating of every pair in the Commonwealth, although he admits that he does not allow him thoughts to drift too often to what it would feel like to finally get his hands on a medal. “A medal is the ultimate goal and I do think about it a little bit,” he said. “I know that I need to focus on the here and now but I feel like if I can continue improving over the next five months, there’s no reason why I can’t do well in both singles and doubles.”
Clyne has a hectic few months in store – he will fly to Hong Kong this weekend for a tournament before jetting back to Europe for the World Team Championships in France at the end of this month and the World Championships in Manchester in December. He wouldn’t have it any other way though. “It’s busy, but that’s how I like it,” he said. “I can’t belive Gold Coast is almost here - but that’s so exciting.”
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