As if it needed it, Churchill Edgbaston Priory's clash with Manchester Pontefract tonight, has been given extra relish by the pairing of opponents David Palmer and Lee Beachill.
Priory lead the North Group table while Manchester lie second, but Palmer is probably more interested in exacting revenge for the defeat inflicted on him by Beachill in the US Open final earlier this month. Then Beachill triumphed over the Australian 11-7, 9-11, 8-11, 11-1, 11-8, winning in the fifth after 84 gruelling minutes.
During the early exchanges in Boston, Beachill accidentally grazed Palmer's eye and there ensued the usual plethora of let appeals and counter-appeals. So no love lost there, then.
The combination of league position and bragging rights over fellow professionals will maintain the intensity throughout the playing order. Adrian Grant, Priory's world No 18, faces England teammate James Willstropp, the world No 9 while Peter Barker, world No 22 and still rising, plays former British Open champion David Evans.
While Evans does not play as much squash on the circuit as he once did, Barker will be only too aware that the Welshman was once in the world's top five.
Hadrian Stiff completes the men's quartet for Priory in a showdown with ex-England international Nick Taylor, while, in the women's rubber, Vicky Botwright, the world No 7 will have to be guarded in her match with Jenny Duncalf, ranked two places beneath her on the WISPA tour.
Wolverhampton face Benz-Bavarian Duffield while Birmingham University play Oberthur Strings Tewkesbury in the South Group.
