Round 2 Scores
Austria (5) 7-2 France
Romania 7-5 Indonesia
Chinese Taipei (4) 7-3 Poland (13)
THERE WERE three more second round matches today at the Dafabet World Cup of Pool as minnows Romania continued their great run with a come-from-behind win over Indonesia. Austria and Chinese Taipei both had comfortable wins to set up a quarter-final clash on Saturday afternoon; Austria put paid to French hopes while Chinese Taipei scotched the chances of a decent-looking Polish side.
Taking place at the York Hall in London, the Dafabet World Cup of Pool features 32 two-man teams from around the globe competing for a $250,000 prize fund. Televised live in over 40 countries around the world, the event is now entering its tenth year.
In the opening game Austria reached the quarter-finals for the second consecutive year as they comfortably defeated France 7-2. Mario He and Albin Ouschan looked an improvement on their first round match and will be a force to be reckoned with at the weekend.
The French duo of Stephan Ouschan and Alex Montpellier were a little off the pace but got the score to 2-2 after losing the first two racks. The matched turned quite quickly as Montpellier swerved out of a snooker, caught the 1 ball but scratched to leave Ouschan a 1/9 combination. They followed that with a golden break to go to swiftly move to 4-2.
The burly He seemed to have worked out the break as he crunched the pack open with some old-school power and a miss from Montpellier allowed them to increase the lead.
When Ouschan tied the French up in an inescapable snooker the writing was on the wall and the Austrians ran out 7-2 winners.
Commented Ouschan, “It was a very good performance, they struggled early in the match and we took our chances to take the lead. We don’t care who we play next because they are both tough teams.”
He said, “The break worked very well for us and that is almost everything when you can get a break to work for you at a tournament. At the World Cup of Pool it is straight knockout so the break needs to be good for you to progress.
“It is race to nine in the next round. We prefer to play the longer races because the luck you can have is limited. When it is longer races the better teams are more likely to come through.”
Giant-killers Romania continued their march to glory as they overcame the entertaining Indonesians in a thrilling second round match. Babken Melkonyan and Ioan Ladanyi looked nervous at times but they closed the match with some great shots under the pressure of the shot clock.
The Indonesians made the brighter start as they pulled away from 2-2 to take a 5-3 lead in the race to seven match. The big turning point came in the ninth rack when Muhammad Simanjuntak and Irsal Nasution colluded to foul without being aware of their actions.
With the Indonesians looking to push out, Nasution pointed with his cue to the exact spot on the rail where his partner wanted to push the white and he left it there when he played the shot.
That was a foul under the rules and with the resulting ball in hand the Romanians took the rack and then the next to level it. The Indonesians had chances but the match moved to a seemingly frantic pace as the 30 second shot clock came more into both teams games. In the end it was Romania who won through as they took four consecutive racks for victory.
The Romanians were delighted to get over the line and into the last eight at their first World Cup visit where they will face England A:
“I am very happy, of course, to go through to the quarter-finals – I am still shaking from the match,” said Babken.
“You could see that our game wasn’t so good. I wasn’t prepared well because I was very nervous. At 5-3 down I said to Ladanyi we just needed to win four racks and that is what happened. The foul there was important in giving us a chance at the table.
“Playing England will be very difficult, probably the most difficult match we could have had. They are the home team and have a good crowd behind them. We will need to work on our game before that match because they are a very good team.”
In the final match of the session Chinese Taipei put paid to Polish hopes as they ran away with it to win 7-3 and book a last eight match against Austria. With Ko Pin Yi firmly cemented as World No.1 and his partner Chang Yu Lung a shot-maker par excellence, it was always going to be a tough proposition for Poland (Mateusz Sniegocki and Wojciech Szewczyk) and so it proved.
The Taiwanese raced into a 4-0 lead as the Poles barely got to the table. That became 5-1 before the Poles rallied to win two racks and give themselves a chance but that was to be their last meaningful contribution to the match.
The following broadcasters are screening live coverage of the Dafabet World Cup of Pool:
Sky Sports – GB and Ireland; Sky – New Zealand; CCTV – China; Nova TV – Czech Republic & Slovakia; OSN – Middle East & North Africa; ESPN 3 – USA; ESPN Latin America –Central & South America; Viasat – Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Bulgaria & the Baltic states.
For fans outside those territories, Perform Group will be streaming the event via their www.livesport.tv service. In addition the Dafabet World Cup of Pool is syndicated around the world as 31 x 1 hour programmes by Matchroom Television.
Featuring 32 two-man teams from around the world, the Dafabet World Cup of pool is celebrating its tenth year as defending champion England attempt to become the first team ever to successfully defend the title. The event runs from 22nd to 27th September.
Tickets are now on sale at www.SEETickets.com and are priced at £10.00 per evening session (Tuesday to Friday), £12.50 per evening session on the Saturday and Sunday. Weekend afternoon sessions are £7.50 while Tuesday to Friday afternoons are free!
A season ticket covering all sessions is priced at £65.00.
The World Cup of Pool will carry a $250,000 prize fund including $60,000 for the champions. The event will be produced by Matchroom Sport Television and televised live on Sky Sports and then syndicated internationally as 31 x 1 hour programmes.
Diamond Billiards are the Official Table of the 2015 World Cup of Pool; the Official Cloth is supplied by Iwan Simonis and the Official Balls are Super Aramith. The Official Cue, Chalk and Rest are supplied by Predator.
Luke Riches, Matchroom Sport: [email protected]
Notes: Matchroom Sport are one of the world’s leading producers of televised sport and are responsible for over 1,000 hours of original programming across a range of sports. Based in the UK and chaired by charismatic founder Barry Hearn, the World Cup of Pool is one of a stable of pool events that include the World Pool Masters and the Mosconi Cup.