LAUSANNE, 2017-11-20
Dick Jaspers may have had a disappointing week in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, but he showed his mental strength in Lausanne, Switzerland a week later. He beat the world's best players there, to win his second Lausanne trophy.
The group stages in the IOC city left Diane Wild and her team with the following quarterfinals:
Caudron - Polychronopoulos (40 - 30 in 20/19)
Sánchez - Jae Ho Cho (40 - 25 in 26)
Zanetti - Bury (40 - 8 in 8)
Jaspers - Blomdahl (40 - 33 in 23)
The eye-catching match was of course Zanetti's phenomenal 5.000 average against his former Agipi teammate. Not many players can say they have ever reached such an average, but for the Italian maestro it was the fifth (!) time he did it.
Jaspers had lost his group match against Blomdahl, but he balanced the old rivalry in the quarters. Jae Ho Cho had a lesser day against Sánchez, and the new world champion Frédéric Caudron looked strong all the way.
The semi's were full of quality, but they lacked a bit of excitement. Jaspers waltzed over Zanetti (40 - 15 in 19/18), and Caudron, the current world nr. 1, had no mercy with Sánchez, the former world nr. 1: 40 - 23 in 20/19.
It gave Lausanne a final between two players who have close to being the best in the world for the past decade. On this particular day, the Dutch player was the dominant one. He saw his run of ten being countered by a nine from the Belgian, and at halftime there was nothing in it: 22-20. But the second half of the match was all Jaspers: 40 - 24 in 16 innings.
Final ranking of the Lausanne Billiard Masters:
1. Dick Jaspers
2. Frédéric Caudron
3. Marco Zanetti
4. Dani Sánchez
5. Torbjörn Blomdahl
6. Jeremy Bury
7. Jae Ho Cho
8. Nikos Polychronopoulos
9. Dong Koong Kang
10. Tien Duy Ma
11. Michael Boulaz
12 Fernando Couto