Game 1 : 11-9 to Darwish

Gregory with his easy style of movement seemed to have been absorbing all of Karim's attacking shots pretty well and recovering them well enough to actually expose Karim's movement especially in the back corners. Gregory would absorb a certain number of attacking shots and then play some low-fast fading kills to surprise Karim and this tactic worked for the most part of the game BUT Greg's error rate nullified the success of his winners. Karim stayed with him with some low attacking boasts which Greg couldn't answer and by also playing extremely well deep in the back corners, twisting Greg around with exceptional width on all of his cross courts in the middle & later part of the game. They were point for point till 7-all, when Karim found a beautiful low cross court kill on his backhand to take him to 8-7, after which he pumped himself up with a very audible grunt. Maybe this was a sign of things to come. Greg leveled the score and then again Karim took a lead and Greg managed to level it again at 9-all, but Karim fired off two quick points to secure the first game, which proved to be crucial.

Game 2 : 11-7 to Darwish

Greg came out strong and made his presence felt by securing the first point of the game, but Karim answered with 4 unanswered points after which we got confirmation that Greg was still here to play after watching him level the score at 4-all. Then it was Greg's turn to assert his authority on the game and he took a slight lead before the momentum shifted once more and Karim came back roaring to make it even at 7-all. Greg was a bit careless at this point in the match and threw in a forehand drop that was well below the tin and gave Karim the lead. Karim accepted that gift and ran with it as ended the game with an exquisite forehand drop shot, that not only stayed far up on the court but also stayed tight and though the lightning quick Greg got to it, the tightness of the shot prevented him from scrapping it off the side wall and at 11-7, it was game to Darwish, who scored 6 consecutive points to take the second game.

Game 3 : 11-3 to Darwish

By now Greg was in troubled waters, no matter how good u are, u don't allow a player of Karim's caliber to go 2 games to love up and then expect it to be a cake-walk from there to try n pull the match back from him, specially when Karim had that serious all intense look about him, the desire to win the match was evident in Karim's body language, whereas Greg seemed a bit uninterested in the match overall at this point. Greg scored the first point of the game on a stroke where he squeezed Karim in the front backhand corner with his infamous backhand drop shot. Sadly though, not much else was to come from the Frenchman after that as he rolled off three consecutive tins to give Karim a huge headstart. Karim seized the initiative and made sure he did not give any freebees away. He made just one error in the whole of the 3rd game and coupled this style of play with two beautifully carved short angles to the front forehand corner to surprise Greg to such an extent that he was actually searching for the ball in the yellow pages. After that, Greg's head went down and u could see that he was not going to or even try to mount a serious challenge. Another three consecutive tins from Greg to give Karim 9-3 and then again another one to give him match ball. On the last serve-return Greg just hit the ball towards the ceiling and rushed off the court after shaking Karim's hand, obviously disappointed as his title defense failed. The match time was clocked at 38 minutes.