3-Cushion
LIMA - Three players from the home land Peru are certainly out of the game after two days and two defeats in Lima. Guido Sacco, however he's eliminated for the main tournament, was the only hope in days of darkness with his sensational victory against Tayfun Tasdemir last night: 3-2. The struggle for a place in this group will be the duel between Jae Ho Cho and Tasdemir, but Sacco was the player of the evening. He enjoyed the audience with a thrilling denouement.
Ramon Rodriguez couldn't make true his reputation under the pressure of organizing the tournament, Maximo Aguirre (two defeats, 0.816 average) and Rafael Noya (two losses, 0.706) perished in the high class level of a World championship. Only Guido Sacco made a great performance of his second match after the loss on the first day against Jae Ho Cho.
The Peruvian was launched against Tasdemir 15-9 in 9 innings, lost the second set 15-0 in two innings, by a fourteen run of Tasdemir, was 2-1 behind in sets, but then fought back with two winning sets (15-8, 15-13) and shone with a run of eleven. Sacco can watch now the match between Cho and Tasdemir, the Korean is by far the favorite to win the group.
The poor start of the Turk - and the victory of Carlos Campino against Ryuuji Umeda, were the only surprises on the second day, on which Eddy Leppens showed himself again a true World Championship fighter. The Belgian knows too well that he has many points to defend in the world ranking after his stunning finale last year against Dani Sánchez. With a 3-0 victory over Erick Tellez and the highest average (2.500) Leppens can put confidence in a good tournament. Tomorrow he meets a tough rascal at the billiard: Japan's Funaki Kouji.
Lütfi Cenet, who's desire to play in the Dutch or French league has still not been fulfilled, played a superior match against Rafal Noya. He won three sets, had an average of 1.956, an opponent who finished with 0.500 and only twelve caroms, so the start of Cenet was a nice warmup for his next performance in the group against Raimond Burgman.
Martin Horn needed a flaming endrush in his duel with Sameh Sidhom to save his body. It turned out, after trailing 2-0, into a 3-2 victory for the German, who has to play a lot better against the Asian champions Chung-Bok Lee today to enter the main tournament.
Jérémy Bury wasted one set in his duel with Gerhard Kostistansky, but then continued the match in style with sets of 15-2, 15-8 and 15-7. Marco Zanetti towered above his opponent Maximo Aguirre (3-0, 1.551), Javier Palazón defeated Harry Reyes in straight sets (1.184), Jung Han Heo won with a comfortable score against Javier Teran (3-0, 1.607).
Carlos Campino defeated the former world champion Ryuuji Umeda in the late night match: 3-2. The Colombian led 2-0 after two sets, the Japanese came back to 2-2, Campino kept his fighting chance and won the final set 15-13 in 10 innings. Murat Naci Coklu, who plays against Umeda today, is the number one contender in this group.