3-Cushion
ZUNDERT - Not Frédéric Caudron, who won the Christmas tournament five times in the last ten years, not Eddy Leppens, the man who's in a great form, but Roland forthomme and Raimond Burgman play the final later this afternoon. That was the spectacular outcome of the semi-finals in the full house of billiard center Den Hoek in Zundert.
Roland Forthomme finished with a brilliant run of nine against Eddy Leppens. Raimond Burgman came back from far behind (25-10), was at 43-40 for the first time on the lead and beat Frédéeric Caudron with an amazing final sprint (50-47 in 29).
He could even afford to miss one, pretty easy matchbal: ,,I got a strange feeling in my head,'' said Burgman later. ,,So I missed a carom that I really couldn't miss.'' But one inning later, after Caudron had missed, the Dutchman made the finishing ball with a bankshot.
Roland Forthomme started at the same time the final sprint, which brought him to the final for the second time on a row.
The leader of the Snellen home team started the match with a run of seven, continued to dominate the battle for long time (untril 29-22 and 37-33), hesitated a moment and saw his opponent even take the lead at 43-39. Forthomme fought back to 41 and made the winning run of nine under loud applaus of the audience. Leppens made two points in the equalizer: 50-45 in 31.