LUXOR - What a day it turned out to be in the Luxor World Cup. The players were sent into the arena for the first knock-out round of the main tournament, and the numbers one, two and three of the world ranking were sent home, leaving the draw wide open for a large group of hopefuls. The main casualties of the day were Torbjörn Blomdahl, Dani Sánchez and Dick Jaspers.
The players who brazenly took the spotlight at their expense, were Lütfi Cenet, Nikos Polychronopoulos and Quoc Nguyen Nguyen. They are hardly unknowns in the circuit, where leveling has become a fact of life. But still, not often will you see the best three on the ranking disappear from a World Cup on day one. Frédéric Caudron, the number four, came close to joining the top three. The Belgian clash with Eddy Leppens looked to go all wrong for Caudron, who saw Leppens start furiously to lead 14-0 after five innings and 24-7 (in 12) at halftime. He couldn't keep it up though, and produced only eleven points in the next fifteen innings, handing Caudron the room to make a comeback. He rose to the occasion, ran a nine and finally escaped with a win: 40-38 in 29 innings.
A fourth top player loss would have been fitting on this crazy day, with playing quality that was unimpressive: Only two of the sixteen matches were over two average. Eddy Merckx was the best of the winners (40 in 19), and the Koreans, Turks and Belgians dominated with four, four and three players in the second round, respectively.
Torbjörn Blomdahl's lead in the world ranking is not yet under grave pressure, but Caudron, Merckx and Tasdemir are threatening the number two and three spots (Sanchez and Jaspers). At their heels are Marco Zanetti and Roland Forthomme, but these two also did not survive the first day in Egypt. The Italian was beaten by Ahmet Alp, the tournament hero so far. The Belgian was eliminated by Javier Palazón : 40-30 in thirty innings.
The last session of the day saw a strong performance from Jérémy Bury, who kept Colombian Jose Juan Garcia at a two-point distance (40-38 in 28), a quick acceleration by Nikos Polychronopoulos, who wasted no time disposing of Dick Jaspers (35-17 in 16, then a win at 40-29 in 22) and a show by Vietnamese Nguyen Nguyen, who wears his heart on his sleeve and loves to entertain the crowd. Dani Sánchez could not get a grip on the Asian boy wonder, not even at 30-28 after 21 innings.
At crunch time, as nerves started to jangle, the Vietnamese had the better finish: 40-36 in 26. I t meant that Eddy Merckx was the only player to finish inside of twenty inings, with Pedro Piedrabuena (beating Murat Naci Coklu) and Jung Han Heo (win over Khaled Erfan) even needing 36 and 34 innings, which is rare in a main tournament. As for high runs: both HaengJik Kim andEddy Merckx made a twelve, but that is a very modest score, with this many top players in the arena.
Tomorrow's matches, 11.00 uur: Lütfi Cenet-Chi Yeon Cho Jae Ho Cho-Tayfun Tasdemir Murat Tüzül-Ahmet Alp HaengJik Kim-Eddy Merckx 13.00 uur: Nikos Polychronopoulos-Jung Han Heo Dong Koong Kang-Frédéric Caudron Jérémy Bury-Javier Palazón Quoc Nguyen Nguyen-Pedro Piedrabuena
Dani Sánchez, outplayed by Quoc Nguyen Nguyen
Nikos Polychronopoulos with a superb start to a win against Dick Jaspers
Frédéric Caudron escaped from a big backlog against Leppens and eventually survived
Dick Jaspers, the ranking's number three, was beaten by Polychronopoulos
Dong Koong Kang, one of four Koreans still in the World Cup
Eddy Leppens couldn't finish it of against Caudron
Jérémy Bury defeated the former junior world champioen Jose Juan Garcia by two points
Quyet Chien Tran ran into a great finish: Tüzül with nine to the end
Jung Han Heo, a win in 34 innings against Egyptian Erfan