World No.1s Mostafa Asal and Hania El Hammamy are set to return to defend their titles at the Optasia Championships 2026, with the pair having been named as top seeds for the Gold-level event in Wimbledon, London.
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Held at The Wimbledon Club between March 24-29, the Optasia Championships is one of the most prestigious events on the PSA Squash Tour calendar and this year has seen 12 of the men’s top 20 and 9 of the women’s top 20 named across two star-studded draws.
Current World Champion and World No.1 Mostafa Asal has been a dominant force on the PSA Squash Tour this season and will return in search of back-to-back titles at the event after defeating Paul Coll in last year’s final. The Egyptian’s draw is almost as tough as it gets, though, with a potential route to the final including a quarter-final against former World No.1 Mohamed ElShorbagy and a last-four meeting against one of No.6 seed Marwan ElShorbagy or No.4 seed Joel Makin.
2017 champion Mohamed, 35, has started the 2026 calendar year in strong form after picking up his 52nd PSA Tour title at the Squash on Fire Open, while British No.1 Makin will be looking to push himself back into the top four in the World Rankings after an injury-riddled season to date.
The bottom half of the draw is equally as stacked in the men’s event, with it including the likes of World No.3 Karim Gawad, World No.4 Diego Elias, World No.6 Youssef Ibrahim and World No.11 Leonel Cardenas.
No.3 seed Elias, in particular, has been handed a tricky draw, with a potential second-round meeting with England’s rising star Jonah Bryant awaiting the 2024 World Champion. 20-year-old Bryant has enjoyed a standout season on the PSA Squash Tour, having reached the semi-finals of the Qatar Classic and Hong Kong Open, and quickly closing in on a spot in the world’s top 10.
Meanwhile, two-time champion Gawad sits in the same quarter of the draw as talented left-hander Ibrahim, whom he has a poor head-to-head record against, having lost six of their seven meetings on the PSA Tour.
In the women’s draw, top seed Hania El Hammamy will face stiff competition in her title defence, with eight-time World Champion Nour ElSherbini arriving to compete at the Optasia Championships for the first time in her career.
ElSherbini, a 45-time winner on the PSA Tour, has been named as the No.2 seed in the women’s draw and finds herself in the same quarter as No.6 seed Nada Abbas and the same half of the draw as British No.1 Georgina Kennedy, last year’s runner-up in London.
Kennedy will be sure to draw in the home crowds 12 months on from reaching her maiden Gold final on the PSA Squash Tour at this event, with the former Commonwealth Gold medallist opening her account against one of Tesni Murphy or Lucy Beecroft, before a potential quarter-final tie with No.8 seed Farida Mohamed.
World No.1 El Hammamy has proven the player to beat on the PSA Squash Tour this season, having already won four major titles and lost just two of her 30 matches since the start of the campaign. The 25-year-old could face home favourite Jasmine Hutton, the No.7 seed, in the quarter-finals if the event were to go to seeding.
Also returning to The Wimbledon Club will be 2024 champion Satomi Watanabe and America’s Amanda Sobhy, who have been named as the No.3 and No.5 seeds, respectively. The pair sit in the same quarter of the draw as one another.
Wildcard spots for this year’s event have been awarded to English duo Patrick Rooney and Sam Osborne-Wylde, who will face off against Curtis Malik and Gregoire Marche in the first round, respectively.
