Torbjörn Blomdahl: a phenomenal comeback

SUWON – The Swede Torbjörn Blomdahl (49), who’s resume in three cushion already was impressive, has added a new highlight to his careeer. After his stellar performance in the World Cup in Suwon, where he beat Marco Zanetti in the final (3-1) the Swedish phenom is also the new nr. 1 on the world ranking list.

Frédéric Caudron was dethroned in Suwon, his successor is the most laureled player of this generation, and the best of all time behind Raymond Ceulemans.

Torbjörn Blomdahl played his Korean tournament, which he won last year also, with alomost supernatural averages over 2 and 3, and a general pace of 2.370. Had he not had a minor hickup against Vietnamese Ma (45 in 33), he would have bettered the world record for tournament average.

His World Cup average of 2.370 was slightly below Caudron’s world record of 2.420, set last year in Vienna. It must be said though, that the general level in Suwon was higher than in all preceding World Cups.

Blomdahl was often brilliant and unstoppable in Suwon. Two Vietnamese players, Quock Nguyen Nguyen and Xuan Cuong Ma, were his victims in the early rounds; next was Dutchman Raimond Burgman: Blomdahl did not lose a set in those three matches.

In the semifinal he beat Dick Jaspers 3-1 (2.764) and in the final Marco Zanetti. As in the Jaspers match, the Swede only lost one set, the third one 15 - 10.

The final showed how high the level of three cushion is nowadays: all four sets were decided in 6 innings or less: Blomdahl won three, in 3, 5 and 5 beurten, Zanetti one, in 6 innings.

Blomdahl showed his class from the get-go: he produced a run of 13 that set the tone for the match. The result: 15-3 in 3, 15-6 in 5, 10-15 in 6 and 15-2 in 5.

Hardly ever, or never before, the conclusion had to be, did the top 10 of a World Cup tournament perform at this level.

The top 10 players by average:
1 Blomdahl 2.370, 2 Zanetti 1.746, 3 Jaspers 2.053, 4 Merckx 1.639, 5 Kasidokostas 1.575, 6 Sánchez 1.628, 7 Bury 1.491, 8 Burgman 1.544, 9 Dong Koong Kang 2.000, 10 Hyun Suk Kim 1.580.

The new top twelve of the world ranking list:
1 Torbjörn Blomdahl 382, 2 Frédéric Caudron 375, 3 Eddy Merckx 340, 4 Filippos Kasidokostas 330, 5 Dani Sánchez 316, 6 Sung-Won Choi 301, 7 Kyung-Roul Kim 300, 8 Dick Jaspers 284, 9 Jérémy Bury 280 10 Marco Zanetti 237, 11 Jae Ho Cho 213 12 Martin Horn 212, 13 Murat Naci Coklu 212.