HANAM - The 21-year-old Myung-Woo Cho shook Dani Sánchez's hand, had a fist-to-fist with Semih Sayginer and smiled gently to the camera. The Korean prodigy had just finished his match with Torbjörn Blomdahl, one of the all time most famous champions and remained unbeaten in his group with three world stars: HaengJik Kim (40-18 in 16), Marco Zanetti (40-16 in 18) and the last Torbjörn Blomdahl (40-18 in 16). Six match points out of three encounters, 2,400 on average.
What a pleasure to watch in these matches against the greats of three cushion. The focus, the huge talent, the wonderful creations on the billiard and that impassioned look on the chair, like at the end of the match against Blomdahl, when the mission was done. The big, dark eyes turning up, bulging his jaws to blow away the tension and walking to the billiards to score..., nothing but score. The champion, eliminated after three losses, could only watch the young star in admiration.
Marco Zanetti, finally as the last of the eight finalists, is the number two behind Myung-Woo Cho among a number of four Europeans: Semih Sayginer, Tayfun Tasdemir, Eddy Merckx and Marco Zanetti, together with three Koreans and one Vietnamese. Dick Jaspers, Dani Sánchez and Torbjörn Blomdahl have been eliminated.
The final day of pre-rounds was a formality for Group A, in which Jae-Ho Cho and Quyet Chien Tran were unreachable after two days. Jae-Ho Cho reached the maximum score with three wins and 2,608 on average. The leader won his last match against Tran 40-34 in 16 after runs of 8 and 12 in the first part of the match. The Korean player was the highest of the entire field of sixteen in the preliminaries.
Much more tension was seen in Group B with the three Europeans; Sayginer, Sánchez and Merckx ending up with four match points. The average decided at the finish with the minimal difference in Sayginer's advantage followed by Merckx and Sánchez with 1,789, 1,762 and 1,716. The match between Merckx and Sayginer was crucial: the Belgian started 8-0-0-0-5-0-0 and forced Sayginer to chase. The Turk scored 8, 5, 7 and finished the match with 4: 40-24 in 15. Sánchez defeated Choong-Bok Lee 40-29 in 18, but used two innings too much to pass Merckx.
Dick Jaspers was the player who had to pay the price in Group C, in which Tayfun Tasdemir and Jung-Han Heo were topping the world champion on match points. The Korean dealt with Jaspers himself (40-33 in 23) after a match that went up to 30 points in the Dutchman's favour, but showed a better Heo to the end. Tasdemir had to put up a tough fight with Bong Chul Kim, the still pointless Korean, who started with eight. At 36-36 and later 38-38, Tasdemir finished it off with two: 40-38 in 22.
The final standings after the preliminaries:
Group A:
1 Jae-Ho Cho 6-2,608-12
2 Quyet Chien Tran 4-2.192-10
3 Sung-Won Choi 2-1.803-8
4 Wan Young Choi 0-1.132-11
Group B:
1 Semih Sayginer 4-1,789-10
2 Eddy Merckx 4-1.762-10
3 Dani Sanchez 4-1,716-8
4 Choong-Bok Lee 0-1.258-6
Group C:
1 Tayfun Tasdemir 5-2.033-9
2 Jung-Han Heo 4-1.701-12
3 Dick Jaspers 3-1,948-14
4 Bong Chul Kim 0-1.250-8
Group D:
1 Myung-Woo Cho 6-2,400-11
2 Marco Zanetti 4-1,811-14
3 HaengJik Kim 2-1,661-8
4 Torbjörn Blomdahl 0-1.245-8.
The final ranking:
1 Jae Ho Cho
2 Myung Woo Cho
3 Tayfun Tasdemir
4 Semih Sayginer
5 Quyet Chien Tran
6 Marco Zanetti
7 Eddy Merckx
8 Jung Han Heo
Sunday, quarter finals:
Jae-Ho Cho - Jung Han Heo
Myung-Woo Cho - Eddy Merckx
Tayfun Tasdemir - Marco Zanetti
Semih Sayginer - Quyet Chien Tran