MÖNCHENGLADBACH/STUTTGART - The focus is back in the game of Dave Christiani, the Dutchman who is seen as one of the most capricious talents in international three cushion. In the German league, where the top match between BC Stuttgart and BC Munich ended in an 8-0 win for Stuttgart, Christiani was the rising star in the double weekend with a 40-point match in 10 innings. "I finally managed to play a top match for my German team, that gives me satisfaction.''
The Dutchman comes from a difficult period in his private life as his girlfriend Daisy lost a child at birth. At the Masters in the Netherlands, his performance had its ups-and-downs. Saturday in Germany, Christiani lost in a moderate match to Jörg Ikenmeyer (40-38 in 36), but on Sunday, Dave was unstoppable in his match against Stefan Dirks (40-5 in 10 innings). "I was able to score two runs, 10 and 13, in the first innings and finished well afterwards'', Christiani said. With Bergisch Gladbach, the Dutchman achieved a comfortable victory in the away match at BSV Velbert: 0-8.
The league weekend was dominated by the top match between BC Stuttgart and BC Munich, among the top three teams in the bundesliga. BC Stuttgart took the lead by an 8-0 victory and now tops the table with 23 points ahead of BC Magdeburg and BC München with 22 points. In the top match, Tayfun Tasdemir was the best man with a victory over Kostas Papakonstantinou (40-31 in 18). Filippos Kasidokostas went to Germany after his victory in a Grand Prix in Greece and played on second position in the team of BC Stuttgart. The Greek current number one defeated Johann Schirmbrand 40-28 in 24. The other victories came to the name of Thorsten Frings against Kostas Kokkoris (40-32 in 32) and Ramazan Durdu against Christodoulidis (40-32 in 32).
On Sunday, BC Stuttgart and BC Munich had a day off. BC Magdeburg, that lost to BCC Witten on Saturday, 5-3, took the second place on Sunday by beating Bottroper 6-1. Dick Jaspers played a draw against Eddy Leppens on Saturday (40-40 in 18) and won to Christian Rudolph on Sunday 40-19 in 19. Jakob Haack Sörensen had an excellent weekend: on Saturday, he bested Dion Nelin 40-38 in 24, on Sunday he was the better of Martin Horn 40-27 in 25.
Jef Philipoom was successful with a victory over Eddy Merckx 40-35 in 17 innings with a run of 16. On Sunday, Philipoom won in 19 innings. The Dutch Glenn Hoffman and Jean van Erp played with Bottroper against BC International. Hofman defeated Martin Horn 40-37 in 31, Van Erp beat Roestel 40-17 in 24.
The top of the ranking:
1 BC Stuttgart 10-23
2 BC Magdeburg 11-22
3 BC Munich 10-22
4 BCC Witten 11-18
5 BSV Velbert 12-17.
Tayfun Tasdemir led the BC Stuttgart team to an 8-0 victory over BC München