World Cup final day on Saturday, not finished

VEGHEL - The new Vietnamese billiard nation is heading for a great future and welcomed another magnificent winner in the World Cup in Veghel. 40-year-old Quyet Chien Tran won the final against Belgian Frédéric Caudron (56) 50-38 in 28/27 innings and is the fourth Asian winner this year in five World Cups. For Quyet Chien Tran, it was his second of this year and fourth overall. The fifth World Cup in Veghel is the last international tournament for now, but the organizers have plans to return to the world calendar within two years. The success of Quyet Chien Tran, spearhead of the current generation of Vietnamese players, doesn’t come out of the blue. The Asian country, which competes with South Korea, is slowly becoming a major deliverer of winners. The Vietnamese became world champions for nation teams in Germany this year, Phuong Vinh Bao was dethroned as world champion and Quyet Chien Tran won his second 2024 World Cup in Veghel this Saturday after Bogota earlier this year.

The Asians are the sovereign winners in this cycle, as Duc Minh Tran (in Ho Chi Minh) and Jung Han Heo (Ankara) also wrote a World Cup to their names. The only European so far was Dick Jaspers in Porto. Not even Frédéric Caudron, back from his adventure in PBA, could change that. The Belgian star was so baiting for his first World Cup, beating Dick Jaspers, Myung Woo Cho, TTT Nguyen and Tayfun Tasdemir in the preliminary stage, but stumbled against the indestructible technician and warrior Quyet Chien Tran.

It didn’t look like that at the start of the final. Frédéric Caudron had no a famous start at all, but Quyet Chien Tran not only missed the starting shot, then he missed four more times, before opening the counterattack with 7. The Vietnamese took a lead at 20-17, then levelled with Caudron to 35-34, after which he had the better final rush when Caudron had seven misses in nine innings in that final phase. The final score came at 50-38.

The World Cup had its many moments of glory with the Vietnamese and Belgians leading the way. Quyet Chien Tran, the winner, played the best match with 40 in 9 (4.444 average), Tayfun Tasdemir had the highest series (17), but Phuong Vinh Bao, who was unfortunate to be eliminated, the best average with 2.522 over three games.

The World ranking is still led after Veghel by Dick Jaspers with 426 points ahead of Quyet Chien Tran, with 380 and Myung Woo Cho with 342. The Veghel winner Quyet Chien Tran does lead the 2024 World Cup ranking.

Quyet Chien Tran, the glorious winner at the World Cup in Veghel

Semi-finals

Frédéric Caudron-Tran Thanh Tu Nguyen 50-45 in 31, 1,612/1,451

The first major success for Frédéric Caudron after his return from his Korean adventure is getting closer. The first Belgian in the semi-finals again shows up as the flawless finisher in the match with TTT Nguyen. The course is exciting, but lacks the beauty expected from the first Belgian/Vietnamese clash. The high runs fail to come up, the two players remain remarkably close. Caudron's feared speed of scoring only comes later in the match. And the Vietnamese, so strong against Dick Jaspers in the quarter-finals, feels a growing stress. Still, Nguyen leads by a margin of seven after 10 innings: 19-12. The Belgian continues his attack with a striking part in the match: 5 times 4 in a phase when the Vietnamese makes 6 and 3. The decision falls at 49-43 in favor of Caudron: the Belgian looks to finish, misses one more time after 9 in an exciting silence still at 49-43. The winning carom comes one inning later: 50-45 in 31.

Quyet Chien Tran-Peter Ceulemans 50-37 in 23/22

The World Cup ends for Peter Ceulemans after a wonderful tournament, in which he came from qualification (beating Jean Paul de Bruijn), survived the first group stage with Tasdemir and Heo and reached the semi-finals beating Jun Tae Kim and Forthomme. This was the second semi-final in the career for one of the few amateurs on the circuit with a four-day working week. Vietnamese Quyet Chien Tran was a bridge too far, despite a just-failed come-back towards the end of the match. Tran, who started 8, was the much better starter with 12-4 in 3, 20-5 in 7 and a generous 27-6 in 8. Peter Ceulemans commented later: ’’The match definitely didn't go well for me, the balls fell few times unlucky, narrowly wrong. And then it's almost impossible for such a player.’’ The Belgian still had a strong period in which he made 5, 3, 4 and 6 and came back to 39-32. The Vietnamese felt the sudden pressure and played out flawlessly with 7.’’My tournament was wonderful, too bad it went a bit unhappily in my last game,‘’ Ceulemans realised.

The overview of the 5th World Cup in Veghel:

The fifth and final World Cup in Veghel will go down in sporting history as one of the best of all time. The high averages, brilliant matches and magnificent runs followed each other rapidly. The best example was the group of four that ended on the first match day of the main draw with a record foursome of 2.080. Phuong Vinh Bao, the newly dethroned world champion, even finished fourth and last with 2.522 on average: Bao was eliminated with an absolute top-average. The averages were further: Sameh Sidhom 2,181, Myeong Jong Cha 2,245, Turgay Orak 1,516. The high runs in that group of qualifying round: 15, 15, 12 and 10. Furthermore, Tayfun Tasdemir played out a match with 17, Turgay Orak with 15 and Peter Ceulemans started a match with 15 later in the tournament.

Excelling Vietnamese Thanh Luc Tran won the final qualifier with 3.076 on average ahead of Frédéric Caudron with 2.424. The main tournament started with the Jaspers-Caudron clash, which ended in a draw. Most high-scoring matches in that round came from Quyet Chien Tran (40-3 in 9 against Glenn Hofman), Turgay Orak (40 in 11), Frédéric Caudron (40 in 12) and Thanh Luc Tran (40 in 12).

Tayfun Tasdemir excelled in the round of 16 with a win over Martin Horn in 14 innings (run of 16), Peter Ceulemans scored 15 from the start against Jun Tae Kim. TTT Nguyen eliminated Dick Jaspers in the quarter-finals with 50-33 in 14 (Jaspers run of 15, TTT run 14).

De eindstand van de World Cup in Veghel:

1. Quyet Chien Tran 14-1.916-10
2. Frédéric Caudron 11-1.913-11
3. Peter Ceulemans 8-1.701-15
4. TTT Nguyen 6-1.734-14
5. Tayfun Tasdemir 7-2.263-17
6. Dick Jaspers 7-1.650-15
7. Thanh Luc Tran 6-1.675-12
8. Roland Forthomme 6-1.352-12
9. Sameh Sidhom 6-1.905-8
10. Nick Polychronopoulos 6-1.606-11
11. Jun Tae Kim 4-1.645-11
12. Myung Woo Cho 4-1.611-9
13. Martin Horn 4-1.463-9
14. Berkay Karakurt 4-1.457-14
15. Tolgahan Kiraz 4-1.352-12
16. Myeong Jong Cha 3-1.913-12

De nieuwe wereldranking:

1. Dick Jaspers 426
2. Quyet Chien Tran 380
3. Myung Woo Cho 342
4. Eddy Merckx 276
5. Jun Tae Kim 270
6. Martin Horn 268
7. Sameh Sidhom 262
8. Jung Han Heo 248
9. Torbjörn Blomdahl 212
10. Thanh Luc Tran 208
11. Marco Zanetti 206
12. Tolgahan Kiraz 203
13. Tayfun Tasdemir 180
14. Hong Chiem Thai 176
15. Jérémy Bury 171
16. Nick Polychronopoulos 170
17. Phuong Vinh Bao 170
18. Haeng Jik Kim 170
19. Berkay Karakurt 154
20. Peter Ceulemans 143.
21. Myeong Jong Cha 131
22. Ruben Legazpi 126
23. Glenn Hofman 122
24. Frédéric Caudron 120
25. Chang hoon Seo 114