Austria’s Lena Primus only showed off her skills just over a month ago in her home country’s women’s EuroTour event, finishing fifth, and arrived to European Championships with high hopes in some peoples predictions. The 10-ball competition may have gone a little while getting acquainted with the circumstances but the 8-ball then went as expected. The 16-year-old Austrian conquered the brightest medal after winning Maryna Kaliaieva of Ukraine 5-3 in the final match. Austria has now won gold in both girls events after Sarah Kapeller won the 10-ball on Wednesday.
Girls division, L to R: Maryna Kaliaieva (UKR), Lena Primus (AUT), Varvara Voronina (RUS) & Alisa Dianisevichus (BLR)
The boys ’8-ball was a Polish feast. Szymon Kural, who already won silver in the U19 series in a straight pool, took the championship after defeating Germany’s Yuma Dörner 7-4 in the final. Kural was one the best young athletes in the u17 division by winning a gold medal two years ago. He took the lead 4-2 in the final, but after a tactically successful timeout, Dörner rose to level the score at 4 each. At this point, however, Kural stood up and no longer looked back and grabbed the necessary points for himself.
U19 division, L to R: Yuma Dörner (GER), Szymon Kural (POL), Mikita Paluyan (BLR) and Emil-Andrè Gangfløt (NOR)
Dominik Jastrzab, also from Poland, was crowned the winner of the U17 series. 16-year-old Jastrzab showed such a strong performance in the final that his opponent, Estonian Karl Gnadeberg, did not single point with final score being 6-0. Dominik was also the reigning European 8-ball champion after winning the gold 2 years ago when he was only 14 yers old. Like for Dörner, the silver medal was first in Gnadeberg’s career.
U17 division, L to R: Karl Gnadeberg (EST), Dominik Jastrzab (POL), Yannick Pongers (NED) and Dennis Laszkowski (GER)
In the medal table, Poland rose to first place together with Germany with two golden, two silver and two bronze medals. Austria comes on third place with their gold medals in the girls division.
The European Championships end with the finals of 9-ball and teams to be played on Sunday.
All photo © EPBF