3-Cushion
SCHILTIGHEIM - The Spanish team of Coral Colón, led by the Greek Nikos Polychronopoulos, is already one foot in the semi-finals of the European Cup. On the first day of the tournament, right after the opening ceremony at the Agipi center in Schiltigheim, three strong Spaniards defeated their opponents of De Ploeg.
Nikos Polychronopoulos was the only loser in the team: the Coral captain, was defeated, despite a run of twelve in the early stages of his match, by Dutchman Jean van Erp, who had an excellent start.
For his three teammates, the German Thorsten Frings and Belgians Dirk Weeremans and Wesley Jaeger, the obstacles were too high. Thorsten Frings nevertheless had a close finish in his match against Carlos Crespo. He hung on two points of the finish: 40-38 in 32.
Sergio Jimenez had a lightning start and held Dirk Weeremans far behind with 40-25 in 20 innings (2.000 average, run 8).
With the 4-0 lead at the break, Coral Colón was already on a pink cloud. The captain failed in his match with Jean van Erp, who closed the game after 21 innings 40-23. The Greek played a very strange match: apart from his run of twelve, he scored in twenty innings only 11 caroms.
Josep Maria (Mia) Mas took the full profit for his team with a comfortable victory over Wesley de Jaeger. The Spanish winner of a tournament in Thessaloniki, Greece, where he defeated Adnan Yüksel in the final, dominated the whole match against De Jaeger and won 40-28 in 28.
That means for Coral Colón, with three teams in the group, that the team meets Agipi as the next opponent tonight at 18.00. The top two finishers advance to the semi-finals.
This afternoon at 14. two teams from the other group meet: Andernos against Laxou.