NEW YORK - The strategy was both attractive and effective. Torbjörn Blomdahl started his first match in the Carom Café to finish it of within an hour and then quickly left the house for a good sleep. ,,I was lucky that my opponent didn't make so much and left me some good positions'', the Swede looked back on his match against Joel Switala, which he won easily 35-6 in 16 innings. The amiable Frenchman, who entered the second round for quite some dollars, moved like an amateur in a world class field. And Blomdahl? Well, he had just a nice warm-up. ,,I arrived only one day ago, here it is ten o'clock, for me it's four o'clock in the night now.''
With his sixteen innings match Blomdahl was one of the best winners in the first round, in which all forty players in five groups of eight played one match. Dick Jaspers needed two innings more to deal with Quoc Nguyen Nguyen (35-22 in 18). ,,Knowing that this is an opponent to be carefu withl, I must be happy with my start'', concluded the Dutchman.
Frédéric Caudron, Martin Horn, Huberney Cataño and Jae Ho Cho are the leaders in Group A. The Colombian Cataño with the best score after his victory against Sang Jin Lee (35-18 in 22).
Torbjörn Blomdahl, Quyet Chien Tran, Keonhwi Cho and Vinh The Ly had a smooth start in B, where in three of four matches there was a big gap between winners and losers.
Eddy Merckx was the best winner in Group C in his match against Dan Johansen, the Dane who bought himself like Joel Switala into the tournament. The Belgian won 35-19. Duc Anh Nguyen disturbed the illusions of Hugo Patino, leaving the American number one far behind, 35-22 in 21. Semih Saygıner was threatened only at the end of the match by young Korean Jun Ta Kim. He scored an eight in the early part, couldn't ran out, but but won 35-31 at 23. Jérémy Bury defeated Poul Bjerring 35-15 in 19.
Tayfun Tasdemir, best player in the qualifying rounds, didn't show his best form against Lars Dunch. The match was in balance for long time, finally the Turk took an easy win 35-27 in 32. And Nalle Olsson was a way too strong for Michael Kang 35-15 in 22. William Oh is still unbeaten in the tournament and now started with a win against Brian Knudsen 35-32 in 32.
Raymond Ceulemans, already for a week in New York to do some practicing with a friend, was not realy in the match against Gökhan Salman (35-11 in 20), Murat Naci Coklu showed that the Asian champion Haeng Jik Kim is not on his best in New York so far (35-23 in 19), Dong Koong Kang was never in trouble in his match with Daniel Kort (35-19 in 17) and Roland Forthomme was one of the best winners in this round beating Ricardo Carranco 35-23 in 16.
Hugo Patino made a poor start after a clean sweep in the qualifications
Gökhan Salman, in the last 40 by the back door, beat the legend Raymond Ceulemans
William Oh is among the stars in New York. He won all his matches in the preliminaries and started with a win over Brian Knudsen in the second round.