Rubén Legazpi impressive in his final sprint

ANDERNOS - On the final day at the Kozoom Cup, Rubén Legazpi was at his best and crowned himself the winner of the first session. The long, tall Spaniard went past his French rival Mikaël Devogelaere in the ultimate sets to take the overall win and qualification for the final round. The Madrid native, who in his last international appearance before the long stop was the European nations winner with Dani Sánchez, is the first of eight finalists at the Kozoom Cup cycle. The second group is next week from Tuesday to Thursday with Dick Jaspers, Peter Ceulemans and Rui Costa.

Rubén Legazpi started his catch-up race in the last part with three strongly played sets, 10 in 5 innings, and even averaged 2,690 over 8 sets on the final day. ''This last session I felt really good, before, on second day, I had problems with the pressure. My game was too much an up and down match'', was Legazpi's comment. Legazpi. ''The format with three players is nice to play, especially after this year without competition.'' He had to get used, as he said, to the change of tactics. ''I had to anticipate on the positions at the table: the best was to attack on easy positions and defend on difficult positions. Most of all against Devogelaere, because I knew he is a good player, I could only pass him in the last sessions.''

The Spaniard returns to his country to play in the Spanish league in a fortnight and a ranking tournament later in April. ''We are fortunately allowed to play in Spain according to the rules of protocol.''

On the third and final day, Mikaël Devogelaere started with an 8-7 lead. Then it ran to 9-8 and 10-9, when the Frenchman missed out a chance to take a two-set lead. His opponent could finish with 3. And three sets later, Legazpi closed the last session 10-0-0. He ended the 24-sets-match with 13 sets won against 10 for Devogelaere and one for the young, inexperienced Nathan Duriez.

Torbjörn Blomdahl, who pleased the audience three days with expert commentary, was admired by the viewers and closed the third session with: ''This was the longest match I have ever seen.''

The final ranking:

1 Rubén Legazpi 13-191-109-1,752-10
2 Mikaël Devogelaere 10-150-108-1,386-6
3 Nathan Duriez 1-98-105-0,933-5.

Nathan Duriez gained experience in the match with his two seasoned opponents