TRABZON - The great ambition of Eddy Leppens, after many years investing, is to finally penetrate the top twelve of the world ranking. The Belgian has to wait again, for in the World Cup of Trabzon he played an excellent match, but this time he was countered by a formidable Korean, Kyung-Roul Kim. The match ended chilling, because Leppens still seemed to grab his chance when Kim missed five match balls. But at the end the Korean won, 15-13 in the last set.
It all seemed to run successful for Leppens, who won the first set 15-12, saw his opponent win the second 15-1, won the third again and got, after a lost fourth set, enough chances to end the match when Kim failed just before the finish.
That was a little surprising, because Kyung-Roul Kim made in the decider on a 3-1 score for Leppens a run of twelve. He came to his first matchpoint, one inning later, but missed four or five balls in a row, among them two bankshots. Leppens got a few times which he had'nt expected anymore, but stranded at thirteen points. The elimination is undoubtedly a great disappointment again.
The Dutchman Jean van Erp continues his victory march with a strong performance. He already made a big impression in the preliminary round and switched in his match this afternoon the Spanish number one Javier Palazón decidedly off. Van Erp maintained his high level. He started 15-6 in five innings and a run of ten, lost the second in six innings 15-13, won the third with an impressive 15-0 in five innings, lost the fourth again, but kept the best control over his nerves in the war of attrition in the fifth set. The Dutchman won 15-10 and finished with an average of 2.321.
Jérémy Bury and Kouji Funaki fought out an interesting battle in the first two sets, both ended 15-14, the first for Funaki, the second for Bury. Then it was the Frenchman who was ruling the match with 15-1 and 15-8.
Daniel Sánchez held a certain control over his match against Adnan Yüksel, but really couldn't dominate. The Spaniard won the first and the third set, his Turkish opponent took the second and the fourth. Sánchez gained the win in the fifth set with 15-10.