For Nick Kyme, good news does not come any better, writes Matt Westcott.

Playing in a tournament in Calgary, Canada last week, Kyme took a phone call from Bermuda?s director of squash Ross Triffitt.

Although he had hoped the conversation would be a positive one, part of him was also prepared for the worse. He needn?t have worried.

?Nick, you?re in,? was essentially the message imparted by Triffitt.

From that day to this, the Island squash professional has been ?walking on air?. And with good reason. After initially having his application for a wild card into the 2004 Bermuda Open rejected, he has now been told he is in after the Bermuda Squash Racquets Association fought his corner and mounted a successful appeal against the Professional Squash Association?s original decision.

The PSA board had initially said that Kyme?s world ranking of 114 was not high enough to warrant displacing someone further up the standings. The Islander could still play, but he would have to go through the qualifiers.

However, the BRSA were able to prove that precedents had already been set in other tournaments around the world where ?local guys? were given a step up in order to boost their own career and also boost interest in the country where the event was being held.

The U-turn was finally achieved on Friday and Kyme was overwhelmed.

?It?s amazing. It?s something I really needed to do and I was hoping for in order to get my career really rolling as a squash player,? he said, pointing out that just making the first round of the $55,000 tournament would see him catapulted up the ladder.

?This is huge ? career-wise it?s massive. It?s a really big tournament. I am at one right now and all the players know all about it and they are jealous.

?I had to call Ross back an hour later to say ?thank you very much?. Once it sunk in it was probably the best news I have had in a year.?

Kyme, now at the Virginia Open, said, though he would have been disappointed, he would have understood if the PSA had stuck to their guns.

?I definitely respected them because I understood where they were coming from,? he said. ?But I felt it was unfair because it has happened in other tournaments before. When I heard the (original) news I was at another tournament and when I told the other guys they couldn?t believe it either. They thought it was a scandal.?

Kyme found support for his fight from throughout the squash fraternity . . . and beyond.

As well as the BSRA, he was backed by former world champion, current world number three and Bermuda resident David Palmer and by Island Opposition Senator Kim Swan ? Bermuda?s first golf tour pro and someone who could relate to his situation.

Kyme says he could not have done it without them.

?I talked to Ross and my mother and asked them what they thought I should do and whether it was something that was worth fighting for,? he said when asked whether it had been worth the effort.

?I couldn?t do it by myself but Ross and Stephen Young (BSRA president) had my back and Kim Swan also had my back. He called up the day the article (in The Royal Gazette) came out and offered his regrets and asked if there was anything he could do.

?He said he knew what it was like to be starting out in a sports career and thought it was horrendous. He offered to write an appeal for me. Just knowing I had that amount of support, and from someone such as Kim, whom I had never met, meant a lot to me.?

That said, it wasn?t an open and shut case by any means.

?I wasn?t (confident),? he said. ?The PSA is known to drag its feet on these occasions and I was worried they would do so and then say ?Oh, the tournament is finished?. I was trying to keep myself grounded so that if it didn?t come through I wouldn?t be too disappointed and disheartened.

?Confidence has a lot to do with your squash and I didn?t want it to affect me. You have to be 100 percent into what you are doing. If I have this on my shoulder I could have become distracted.?

With his place assured, the hard work is really just about to begin. There is now a desire to put in a performance worthy of the opportunity he has been given.

?I try not to think about it but there definitely is pressure,? he said. ?I won?t be expected to win, but I will be expected to put on a good showing.

?Obviously, I hope to do that and I would like to be able to justify the decision and show the PSA that they made a mistake and that, having now corrected it, it was a good idea. I don?t want them to turn around, wag their finger at me and say ?we told you so?.?

Kyme has been in the spotlight before. He played then World number one Peter Nicol of England at the Commonwealth Games in Manchester in 2002 going down 3-0 (9-1, 9-0, 9-0). But this is different, this time it?s on home turf.

?I like to think (I?ll be able to cope),? he said. ?But I don?t know until I get there. I have never done it front of my own crowd before. I would love to say ?Yeah, I?ll be fine. It?ll be like any other tournament,? but it?s not. For all my family and friends, people who I didn?t know, like Kim Swan, who were behind me, I?d like to make it seem like it was worth the effort for them.

?I?d like to think I am at the stage were I?ll be fine, but, you know what, don?t ask me until March.?