Between them, they had won seven of the last 10 Schools National C Division girls' squash titles and yesterday's final pitted Singapore Chinese Girls' School (SCGS), with their haul of five championships, against two-time winners and defending champions Raffles Girls School (RGS).

After RGS snapped SCGS' three-year winning streak last year, the powerhouse claimed an eighth crown after a 3-2 victory at the Kallang Squash and Tennis Centre.

"It's very tricky, as the top four teams are almost equivalent in standard," said RGS coach Richard Koh, of the level of competition between his school, SCGS, Methodist Girls' School and National Junior College.

"A lot of it depends on the luck of the draw and the order of play. Unfortunately today the line-up wasn't in our favour."

RGS started out strongly, opening the final with a 3-1 win by Ashley Fok over SCGS opponent Hanaan Abuthinin.

Fighting neck and neck, both teams eventually found themselves locked in a 2-2 stand-off and facing a championship decider.

But SCGS' Lim Yu Xuan breezed through the rubber match with a straight-sets win (11-3, 11-2, 11-0) over Cheong Ee Rynn, cementing SCGS' claim on the trophy.

"The girls worked very hard - they really wanted it and they deserve the win as they've put in a lot of effort," said SCGS coach Vicki He.

"We tried our best whether we were the favourites or not."

But SCGS C division squash captain, Secondary 2 student Monica Lim, knows that she and her peers have their work cut out for them when they move to B division next year. There, they will have to repeat today's feat as RGS defeated SCGS 5-0 in the B division final in April.

Both schools have been engaged in a tug-of-war for the title since 2010, each team upsetting the other year-on-year in a bid for the championship.

Lim said: "RGS will be very strong next year as their B division team will have a lot of national players.

"We'll just have to continue to train hard and try our best, and hopefully we'll stand a chance against Raffles next year."