Main role Robinson Morales in New York

NEW YORK - Torbjörn Blomdahl had an excellent start and a small backsliding in his second match. Raymond Ceulemans won his two matches, but played a bit below his level. Eddy Leppens played the best match of all twenty finalists (35-17 against Glenn Hoffman in 11 innings) and Pedro Piedrabuena and Javier Teran have shared among the contenders for a podium place.

But the best of all so far after one day in the final round at the 2012 Open Verhoeven was the Colombian Robinson Morales, who hadn't even impressed that much in the preliminaries. After two sessions in the final, Morales gathered four match points and the highest average of the twenty players: 1.842.

The 34-year-old player from Bogota, born in Manizales, who played out Jérémy Bury in the first round of the World Cup in Vienna last year, won in the second against Kostas Papakonstantinou and then lost in the quarterfinals against Dick Jaspers, defeated in New York two protagonists from the Pan-American championships. He won the first against Andres Naranjo 35-22 in 14 innings and then beat Carlos Capino  35-18 in 23 innings.

That brings him on top of the ranking in the group with Pedro Piedrabuena, who had an excellent start as well with victories against Freddy Cato and Joel Switala. The numbers three and four in the group are Hugo Patino and Raymond Ceulemans.

The Belgian phenomenon had a cautious start with wins against Freddy Cato (35-25 in 39) and Joel Switala (35-13 in 23). Hugo Patino settled into top four beating Sonny Cho and Allan Jensen.

Two players have disappointed with two defeats in their first appearances: Andres Naranjo and Carlos Campino.

Javier Terán leads in the other group with four match points and 1.629 average after wins against George Reyes and Jim Shovak and the highest run (11) so far.

Torbjörn Blomdahl also beat Reyes and Shovak, started with a match in fourteen innings (2.500 average), but needed 30 innings for his win against Jim Shovak.

Roland Forthomme took the first hurdles fairly easy: the Belgian giant defeated Miguel Torres, who was the surprise of the preliminary rounds and Carloman Ortiz, who won his other match against Eddy Leppens.

Mazin Shooni is the other player who's unbeaten in this group. Eddy Leppens played the highest average so far (2.030), but lost his match against Ortiz (35-32 in 22) after his great match against Glenn Hoffman in eleven innings.

The most remarkable fact in this group is that Glenn Hoffman and Miguel Torres both are without points after two rounds.

The results in the preliminaries were:

1) Pedro Piedrabuena (1st Poule F) 14 pts, 175 pts/80 innings
 
2) Eddy Leppens (1st Poule C) 14 pts, 175 pts/83 innings
 
3) Javier Terán (1st Poule E) 14 pts, 175 pts/92 innings
 
4) Andres Naranjo (1st Poule G) 14 pts, 175 pts/107 innings
 
5) Carlos Campino (1st Poule H) 14 pts, 175 pts/119 innings
 
6) Mazin Shooni (1st Poule A) 12 pts
 
7) Miguel Torres (1er Poule D) 12 pts
 
8) Hugo Patino (1er Poule B) 12 pts
 
9) Sonny Cho (2nd Poule G) 12 pts
 
10) Roland Forthomme (2nd Poule D) 12 pts
 
11) Glenn Hofman (2nd Poule C) 12 pts
 
12) Robinson Morales (2nd Poule H) 12 pts

13) Allan Jensen (2nd Poule F) 12 pts
 
14) George Reyes (2nd Poule B) 12 pts
 
15) Carloman Ortiz (2nd Poule E) 10 pts
 
16) Freddy Cato (2nd Poule A) 10 pts
 
17) Joël Switala (tombola)
 
18) Jim Shovak (tombola)

The positions on top in the final groups:

Group A:

1 Javier Terán, 4 match points, 1.628

2 Torbjörn Blomdahl, 4-1.591

3 Roland Forthomme, 4-1.273

4 Mazin Shooni, 4-1.250

5 Eddy Leppens, 2-2.030

Group B:1 Robinson Morales, 4-1.842

2 Pedro Piedrabuena 4-1.458

3 Hugo Patino, 4-1.228

4 Raymond Ceulemans, 4-1.129.