HURGHADA - The blue carpet is rolled out for a new start. The thirteenth World Cup in Hurghada, the last of this year, welcomed the players to the main event, led by eight Turks, seven Koreans and four Belgians and completed by a variated field. Torbjörn Blomdahl, the new world champion, is defending his number one position on the rankings in the next three days, Marco Zanetti is the defending champion in Hurghada.
The wonderful resort on the Red Sea was somewhat less generous to the sunbathers in the week of the start with around 25 degrees, strong winds and some clouds up in the sky. Therefore the stands were well filled in the preliminary rounds. The croud was especially pleased by a sublime Murat Naci Coklu (40 in 15 innings), a Turkish run on the places in the main tournament, Semih Sayginer in a pursuit race and Kostas Papakonstantinou with a top run of 16.
The opening ceremony in the billiard arena of the Sunrise Garden Beach, this morning, welcomed an impressive group of politicians, directors, boards members and sponsors, who could admire the 32 players for the main event from the front row.
Mr. Farouk Barki, sports delegate of the UMB, declared the World Cup for opened at the end of the row of speakers at the official opening. He spoke with pride about the long tradition of Hurghada as the organization of international billiards events: from 2001 fifteen tournaments in a row were organized, the last thirteen for the World Cup.
,This year we are missing a person who has played a key role in the success of the Hurghada events: he granted Egypt the first Europ cup event in 2001 and it has grown from there'', speaking about Wolfgang Rittmann, the president of the European federation CEB. ,,He is currently fighting a battle for his life. We would like to wish him all the best and send him our heartfelt thoughts and prayers.''
The other speakers at the ceremony were:
Mr. Mohamed Kammah, president EFBS
Mr. Ahmet Nasser, president of the African sport federations
General Ahmet Add-Allah, Governor of the Red Sea, who welcomed everybody at the World Cup in Hurghada. ,,With this organization, we want to send a message to the whole world that Egypt is a wonderful and safe country.''
The draw on the final night before the start had an interesting outcome. Four Koreans meet each other, the only two Dutch, Dick Jaspers and Jean Paul de Bruijn, play together and Dani Sánchez against Semih Sayginer is a match to look forward to.
The matches for the first day:
12:00 (Egypitan time):
Torbjörn Blomdahl-Mohsen Fouda
Quoc Nguyen Nguyen-Javier Palazón
Jae Guen Kim-Jin Pyo Hong
Marco Zanetti-Eddy Leppens
14.00:
Tolgahan Kiraz-Roland Forthomme
Dani Sánchez-Semih Sayginer
Murat Naci Coklu-Nikos Polychronopoulos
Tayfun Tasdemir-Arnim Kahofer
16.00:
Dick Jaspers-Jean Paul de Bruijn
Jae Ho Cho-Lütfi Cenet
Sung Won Choi-Sameh Sidhom
Hyung Bum Hwang-Choong Bok Lee
18.00:
Frédéric Caudron-Jose Juan Garcia
Jung Han Heo-Adnan Yüksel
Kostas Papakonstantinou-Gokhan Salman
Eddy Merckx-Murat Tüzül.
Roland Forthomme, Sameh Sidhom, Murat Naci Coklu and Quoc Nguyen Nguyen during the ceremony
Mr. Farouk Barki
UMB referee and one of the main organizers Nabil (Bilo) Salama
