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Porto July 1st 2023
Vietnam’s new stars: Thanh Luc Tran and Vinh Bao Phuong.
World Cup Fridays are always full of drama. Who reaches the K.O. stage, who goes home? It’s often a matter of one carom, one inning, and nerves are tested to the limit.
Group A: Jaspers starts with a loss, but he repairs the damage in style. Chang Hoon Seo and Jaspers advance, Burak Hashas and Pedro Gonzalez are out.
Group B: Zanetti follows in Jaspers’ footsteps: first a loss, then two wins. New Vietnamese phenom Bao Phuong wins the group and advances with the Italian, Soares and Garcia are eliminated.
Group C: The experience and scoring ability of Tayfun Tasdemir and Martin Horn are too much for Gwendal Maréchal and Rui Manuel Costa.
Group D: Jun Tae Kim and Hong Chiem Thai advance, at the expense of two famous Belgians: Eddy Merckx and Roland Forthomme.
Group E: Thanh Luc Tran averages 2.477 and he makes quite an impression. Jung Han Heo joins him, the two Scandinavians, Blomdahl and Sörensen are out.
Group F: Haeng Jik Kim wins the group, Nikos Polychronopoulos is second. Thomas Andersen and Ruben Legazpi go home.
Group G: Sameh Sidhom and Quyet Chien Tran come back tomorrow, Berkay Karakurt and Huberney Catano come up short.
Group H: Jeremy Bury equalizes with five against Myung Woo Cho, sending home the Korean supertalen. The Frenchman is joined by Peter Ceulemans. Tolgahan Kiraz finishes fourth in the group.
Tomorrow’s last 16:
Jun Tae Kim – Jung Han Heo
Sameh Sidhom – Dick Jaspers
Tayfun Tasdemir – Quyet Chien Tran
Haeng Jik Kim – Peter Ceulemans
Chang Hoon Seo – Martin Horn
Vinh Bao Phuong – Hong Chiem Thai
Jeremy Bury – Nikos Polychronopoulos
Thanh Luc Tran – Marco Zanetti
Porto, June 29th 2023.
J.J. Garcia tops a strong field of qualifiers.
Day 4 of the Porto World Cup was one of those “you don’t know where to look”- days. Almost every group was decided in a hard fight, and the level of play was outstanding. A remarkable fact: of the twelve group winners, not a single one was Korean.
Best player of the day was Jose Juan Garcia, who had two wins and 2.105. Not too far behind: Burak Hashas with 1.860 and Hong Chiem Thai with 1.777. Berkay Karakurt recorded 1.875 but he had only one win. It was enough for him, and Thomas Andersen (1.666) also qualified with a win and a loss. Peter Ceulemans (1.230) was the lowest of all the group winners, and he escaped with a 40-39 win in his second match.
Among the strong players who did not make it this time, were Michael Nilsson, Ömer Karakurt, Gwendal Maréchal, Chang Hoon Seo, Robinson Morales and Bong Joo Hwang.
The twelve group winners:
J.J. Garcia – 2.105
Burak Hashas – 1.860
Hong Chiem Thai – 1.777
Jacob Sörensen – 1.632
Ruben Legazpi – 1.632
Huberney Catano – 1.355
Tolgahan Kiraz – 1.333
Peter Ceulemans – 1.230
Berkay Karakurt – 1.875
Thomas Andersen – 1.666
T.L. Tran – 1.613
Roland Forthomme – 1.452
The main event will start tomorrow (Friday). All matches can be watched on AfreecaTV, just click the AfreecaTV button on the UMB page.
Porto, June, 28th 2023
A burst of quality in Porto on day 3.
The World Cup in Porto came alive with splendid averages on Wednesday, as the tables lost some of the trickiness that is inevitable early in the week, and some good players left their calling card. Hero of the day was the Big Friendly Giant from Turkey, Gökhan Salman, who recorded a spectacular 2.400.
The beautiful World Cup format also has a cruel face. Sometimes players score the highest average in their group, and they finish last. Sometimes qualification escapes them by a single point or a single inning. It’s this tough aspect of our sport that players have to learn to live with.
Thomas Andersen won his group not by match points, not by caroms made, but by high run! Burak Hashas played as “lucky loser” today, and he took full advantage. The very seasoned Javier Vera from Mexico will also return on Thursday. The sixteen qualifiers represent all Confederations and all age groups.
The day’s winners:
Gökhan Salman – 2.400
Ömer Karakurt – 1.818
Sam van Etten – 1.463
J.I. Jung – 1.428
Huberney Catano – 1.395
Volkan Cetin – 1.333
Javier Vera – 1.333
Alexander Salazar – 1.250
Burak Hashas – 1.204
Muammer Rahmet – 1.153
Huub Wilkowski – 1.111
Kevin Vasseur – 1.034
Lukas Stamm – 0.983
Robinson Morales – 1.714
Thomas Andersen – 1.153
S.I. Jeong – 1.217
The final qualification round will be played tomorrow, Thursday. The main event (last 32 players) will start on Friday. All matches can be viewed by clicking the AfreecaTV button on the UMB page.
Porto, June 27th 2023.
Turks come out strong on day two in Porto.
The second day of the Porto World Cup had a Turkish flavor. No fewer than four of their players survived the PPQ stage, giving them a ticket to play tomorrow. However, one of the pearls in the Turkish crown, junior world champion Burak Hashas, was eliminated.
The best player of the day, even though he could not win both his matches, was Sergio Jimenez with a shining 2.000. Three points was enough for him to qualify.
The day’s group winners:
Takao Miyashita – 1.428
Emrullah Baegmez – 1.395
Glenn Hofman – 1.363
Ismet Esen – 1.304
Dimitrios Seleventas – 1.276
Rui Edgar – 1.276
Muammer Rahmet – 1.111
Huub Wilkowski – 1.090
Maxime Panaia – 1.052
Vincent Lelievre – 1.016
Norbert Roestel – 0.909
Manolis Minaoglu – 0.909
Sergio Jimenez – 2.000
Jaein Jung – 1.621
Alexander Salazar – 1.176
Valentin Andaluz Anton – 0.913
The easiest way to get to the AfreecaTV stream (8 tables) is via the UMB homepage. Click the AfreecaTV banner there.
Porto, June 26th 2023.
Quiet start to Porto World Cup.
No fireworks yet, in the Porto World Cup on day one. We sometimes see spectacular averages in the pppq round, when good players compete in relatively short matches. Not so this time, the best of the qualifiers were around the 1.200 mark. Surely, we will see that number surpassed in days to come.
The organizers will find joy in the performances of some of their seasoned Portuguese players, four of whom qualified (Rui, Santos Oliveira, Costa, Andrade). It’s also nice to see Alexander Salazar’s name in the list. He was a semifinalist in the World Championship in Antwerp in 2013.
The group winners on day one:
Dimitrios Seleventas 1.250
Allen Schröder 1.250
Rui Edgar 1.200
Alexander Salazar 1.200
Jeongu Park 1.132
Valentin Andaluz Anton 1.132
Herbert Szivacz 1.052
Manuel Santos Oliveira 1.000
Thomas Knudsen 0.952
Do Young Yun 0.882
Davy Siroyt 0.833
Jorge Costa 0.789
Paulo Andrade 0.769
Reggy Brouwers 0.759
Daniel Kristiansen 0.916
Murat Akbicak 0.627
Play in Porto continues tomorrow at 11.00 local time.
All matches can be viewed on the AfreecaTV platform.
Lausanne, June 20th 2023.
The upcoming World Cup in Porto (Portugal) from 26 June to 2 July will be the third in the 2023 series, following Las Vegas (Tayfun Tasdemir the winner) and Ho Chi Minh City (won by Torbjörn Blomdahl). Later in the year, the remaining three World Cups will be hosted in the Netherlands, South Korea and Egypt.
Portugal, and especially the city of Porto, has a special place in World Cup history. No fewer than sixteen of these events were held there, fifteen of those either in Porto or in adjacent Matosinhos. No other city has organized a WC more often! The most successful player in Portugal was Dick Jaspers, who won in Porto four times.
The seeded players for this event are Jaspers, Zanetti, Tasdemir, Merckx, Blomdahl, H.J. Kim, Sidhom, M.W. Cho, Bury, Q.C. Tran, Polychronopoulos, J.H. Heo, J.T. Kim and Horn. The two local wildcards were given to Jose Miguel Soares and Rui Manuel Costa. The UMB/CPB wildcard went to Pedro Gonzalez.
The Porto World Cup will be played on Carrinho tables, with ClassOne B2 black cloth and Dynaspheres balls. The usual ranking points will be at stake: 80-54-36-26-18-10-8. The Dragon Arena, part of the FC Porto complex, will be the venue.
AfreecaTV will stream the entire tournament, with English commentary during the main event (last four days). Live Stream and Results links will be published soon.
Porto has always been center of successful effective meetings, AfreecaTV, Mr. Edwin Lee and Mr. Mirko Kim, will visit Porto World Cup, and will will present a presentation on 28th June, 2023, at 11:00am, for UMB Executive Committee, CEB Board representative and different Billiards companies, they will also have separate meetings with different present parties for discussing future cooperation and business plans.
U.M.B.
