HURGHADA - The world top of three cushion has entered the room in the Hurghada World Cup and the start was sensational. Torbjörn Blomdahl, the number one of the seeding list, had a fabulous kick-off with a run of sixteen from the break in his match against Turkish qualifier Selim Özdem and showed another high class run a little later: with a nine to 30-12 in 7 innings.
And what to think about Eddy Merckx at one of the other tables. The Belgian, with two world titles to his name, dashed off with 21-3 in six innings against Turkish player Ahmet Alp, built it up to 34-3 in eight innings after a 13 run to finish 40-8 in 14.
That all happened in the first session, in which German Johan Schirmbrand's adventure came to an end after having survived four days of competition and eight wins in a row.
He was very close to the win again in his first match for the final rounds, but failed at the end against Korean Jung Han Heo. Two match balls were not enough for Schirmbrand, he missed both of them. And when the Korean had finished, 45-year-old German also missed from the break his last chance to stay in the tournament.
Julian Torres, the 30-year-old Colombian, who traveled around the world to come all the way from Bogota, via New York to Hurghada, was knocked out after one single match. The wild card holder was outplayed by Lütfi Cenet 40-31 in 30 innings.
All those things seem to be only a fortaste for the spectators, after the opening ceremony in the Egyptian arena, of what can happen in this final tournament of the year. Swedish whirlwind Blomdahl, who already has secured the overall victory in the World Cup cycle 2013, is chasing a new win and another prestigious battle with Frédéric Caudron, the world's leader in the ranking.
The top twelve in the world is complemented in this World Cup by four wild cards: Sameh Sidhom and Mohsen Fouda from the hosting country, Anh Vu Duong from Vietnam and Julian Torres. Sixteen players came up from the preliminaries, but because Dani Sánchez could not appear, as a top twelve player, Selim Özden was added as a reserve player.
His joy was only short lived: in his first show up in a main World Cup, the Turk was brutally killed by Torbjörn Blomdahl, as it happened to his country fellowman Ahmet Alp in his match against another heavyweight in this round, Eddy Merckx.
Torbjörn Blomdahl eventually needed 24 innings for the win, what Selim Özden allowed to make a nice comeback: 40-30. ,,He made more points than I did after my start'', concluded Blomdahl. ,,I was not at my best towards the end, when I needed seventeen innings for ten points.''
Three Turks, one Swede, one Colombian, one German, one Korean and one Belgian were at the kick off in the first session of this World Cup final with 32 players.
The schedule is clear: the sessions start at 12.00, 14.00, 16.00 and 20.00, each time with eight players in the main hall.
Kozoom will broadcast all matches live today and in the upcoming days.