3-Cushion
PORTO - The four best teams in the European Cup for clubs are ready to battle it out on Sunday for the places on top in this prestigious tournament. The defending champion FBN Tekstil BK and FC Porto, with a phenomenal Dani Sánchez, ended as the group winners on Saturday-evening, BC Baulois (La Baule) and BK Grøndal were the numbers two that went on to the cross-finals. On Sunday, FBN Tekstil and BC Baulois will face each other in the semi-finals and FC Porto and BK Grøndal meet in the other semifinals. Eddy Merckx, one of the best in average, misses the final day with Morangis Cyllene. BK Varde made another shot at the final round with the top four, but was eliminated by FC Porto. Dani Sánchez was the best of all on average among the 32 players in this Saturday sessions with wins over 40 caroms in 13, 15 and 11 innings, making 3.076 (!) average.
The top five on individual averages were Dani Sánchez with 3.076, Eddy Merckx with 2.375, Tayfun Tasdemir 1.846, Frédéric Caudron 1.791 and Dick Jaspers 1.740.
The semi-finals (live on kozoom)
9:30am (Portuguese time): FBN Tekstil-BC Baulois
11:30am FC Porto-BK Grøndal.
The final match is at 4:30pm
Dani Sánchez, who considers FC Porto as his second home for many years, had a stunning start in his third match against Thomas Andersen, in which he led 18-8 after 5 innings and ran out with a run of 13 in the sixth to 31-8. He finished with an amazing bank shot for 40-12 in 11 innings. That brought Sánchez to 3.076 (!) overall over three matches. For the FC Porto team, Dick Jaspers against Eddy Leppens (29-21 in 12) and Joao Ferreira against Allan Schröder (26-13 in 19) were well on track at that time to pave the way for the home team to a place among the best four.
Frédéric Caudron also was doing very well with matches in 20 and 19 innings, but started remarkably poor in his third performance against Spaniard Jose Antonio Carrasco, who even had a 17-13 lead after 22 innings. In 26 innings the score pointed 26-25. Two innings later, Caudron suddenly found his rhythm and played out with 10 and 4.
FC Porto won the last match against BK Varde 6-2 with a win for Dick Jaspers against Leppens 40-24 in 15 and Joao Ferreira against Schröder 40-33 in 29 innings. The young Portuguese number four in the FC Porto team, who has moved to Madrid and plays not so many matches anymore, finished this round with a strikingly good average of 1.518. The French from La Baule defeated Cartagena 8-0. Jérémy Bury was by far the better of Carlos Anguita 40-19 in 22, Jean Paul de Bruijn also won his third match by staying ahead of Guirao 40-21 in 29 and Mikael de Vogelaere closed with a win over Mercader: 40-27 in 26.
The Turkish defending champion FBN Tekstil, with Tayfun Tasdemir, Murat Naci Coklu, Can Capak and Gökhan Salman was superior in his matches in Group A against Morangis (6-2), Grøndal (6-2) and SIS Schoonmaak (6-2). Tasdemir and Salman, the strong fourth man, were the big winners for the Turks with three victories. BK Grøndal defeated SIS in that group 8-0, lost against Tekstil 6-2 and played a draw against Morangis in the last match. The Parisians could still qualify with a victory, but for the Grøndal team, Sörensen won against Roux and Knudsen against Uymaz. Merckx, who won his previous match against Glenn Hofman in 13 innings (40-21), defeated Dion Nelin 40-32 in 16, including a run of 13. Jacob Haack Sörensen showed up in an excellent match against Raimond Burgman: 40-14 in 15 turns.
SIS Schoonmaak, the finalist last year, missed the best four due to the weak start (8-0 loss) and only played a draw against Morangis. Both the leader player, Glenn Hofman, and Jean van Erp, the team's best man in the preliminaries, lost their three matches.The final ranking in Group A:
1 FBN Tekstil BK 3-6 1.555-11
2 BK Grøndal 3-3 1.473-11
3 Morangis Cyllene 3-2 1.358-13
4 SIS Schoonmaak 3-1 1.304-14.
The final ranking in Group B:
1 FC Porto 5-1-.621-13
2 BC Baulois 5-1.456-10
3 BK Varde 2-1.416-8
4 Casino de Cartagena 0.905-8.
The individual averages over three matches:
1 Dani Sánchez 3.076
2 Eddy Merckx 2.375
3 Tayfun Tasdemir 1.846
4 Frédéric Caudron 1.791
5 Dick Jaspers 1.740
6 Eddy Leppens 1.677
7 Dion Nelin 1.666
8 Jacob Haack Sörensen 1.666
9 Birol Uymaz 1.650
10 Gökhan Salman 1.643
11 Murat Naci Coklu 1.558
12 Jérémy Bury 1.529
13 Brian Knudsen 1.518
14 Joao Ferreira 1.518
15 Thomas Andersen 1.516
16 Jean van Erp 1.478
17 Can Capak 1.432
18 Jean Paul de Bruijn 1.379
19 Allan Schröder 1.361
20 Jean-Christoph Roux 1.258
21 Raimond Burgman 1.253
22 Brian Hansen 1.236
23 Jeffrey Jorissen 1.202
24 Michael Lohse 1.177
25 Mikael Devogelaere 1.175
26 Glenn Hofman 1.115
27 Rui Costa 1.042
28 Carlos Anguita 1.037
29 Jean Reverchon 0.932
30 Jose Antonio Carrasco 0.930
31 Mario Mercader 0.914
32 Orenes Guirao 0.797.
Tayfun Tasdemir, in the best four with the title defender from Turkey
Eddy Merckx, in the top three on average, missed the finals with Morangis.