Joshua Filler
Han Yu goes undefeated to claim her third China Open Women’s title
Conventional pool wisdom dictates that players have to learn how to shrug off losses (games, matches, or tournaments) and focus on the ball, game, match in front of them. You’d have to think, though, that having spent more than just a few thousand Euros getting to and preparing to stay in Shanghai for a week, Germany’s Joshua Filler might have had some initial trouble with the refocusing idea after his first match at the World Pool Association’s (WPA) 2023 China Open in the 64-entrant, Men’s Singles division. He faced Malaysia’s Muhammad Almie Yakup and lost the match, double hill. He did, however, manage to apply the conventional wisdom and refocus quickly, magnificently as it turned out and went on to win it, downing Filipino Anthony “The Dragon” Raga in the final. It was Filler’s second China Open win, having won it previously in 2017, and his fourth overall 2023 title.
Fisher collected his $40,000 first-place prize which, if nothing else, helped to offset what it cost him and his wife, Pia, to get there. Mrs. Filler helped out by finishing 3rd/4th in the Women’s Division, thereby adding $9,000 to their travel funds.
It was an all-China final in the 38-entrant Women’s Division. Han Yu went undefeated, downing Liu Shasha in the finals. It was the third time Yu won this event. She competed in it and finished 17th in her first try (2009), 9th in her second and third (’11, ‘12) and 13th/16th in her fourth (2013). She chalked up her first (recorded) title in 2013, as well, winning the first of three Women’s World 9-Ball Championships. She claimed her first China Open title in 2014, finished 3rd in 2015 and hit the jackpot in 2016, claiming both her second China Open and World 9-Ball titles. In 2018, the year in which she and Filler were awarded the WPA’s World Champion titles, she claimed the Women’s World 9-Ball title again and finished 9th in the China Open. In 2019, she placed 3rd in the China Open, 5th in that year’s Women’s World 9-Ball and added her first All Japan Women’s Championship title.
This was the first China Open since 2019, due in no small measure to the pandemic, which played out differently in China than it did here in the US. While they literally flocked from around the world to attend this returned China Open, the field for both events (no surprise) was full of Chinese and Asian talent, with expected entrants from (among other countries) the UK, Spain, the Philippines, Austria, Poland and Greece. Russia’s Fedor Gorst sat this one out. The event’s two divisions drew their 64 and 38 entrants to Pudong Tangzhen Culture & Sports Centre in Shanghai from Sept. 3-10
There were only two USA competitors; Michael Yednak and April Larson. Yednak lost two in a row to Chinese competitors (9-5, 9-2). Larson lost her opener to China’s Zheng Xiaochun 7-1, but in true ‘put the losses behind you’ spirit, battled to double hill versus Sakura Muramato before being eliminated.
After his loss to Muhammad Almie Yakup, Filler had to win two to qualify for Phase 2. He downed Egypt’s Wesam Hammam and Chinees Tapei’s Hsieh Chia Chen, both 9-5 to qualify for single-elimination. Filler’s four-match trip to the title went through Austria twice, Spain and Poland once and ended up in the finals against the Philippines. He almost got knocked out a second time, when Austria’s Maximilian Lechner opened up the single-elimination (races to 11) phase against him with a double-hill fight. Filler survived it and then defeated Spain’s David Alcaide 11-8, Austria’s Mario He 11-5 and in the semifinals, Poland’s Wojciech Szewczyk 11-7.
Anthony Raga, in the meantime, had gotten by Japan’s Naoyuki Oi and countryman Johann Chua, both 9-5, to qualify for Phase 2. In Phase 2 (races to 11), he defeated Mongolia’s Amgalanbaatar Yeruu (7), and got by Naoyuki Oi a second time (9). He advanced to down China’s Liu Haitao (5) and in the other semifinal, Chinese Tapei’s Wu Kun Lin (6).
Aside from the normal display of applause-winning shots, positional skills and the normal tension of an international final, the match lacked the kind of hoped-for drama spectators may have been expecting in a match between two ‘above 800’ Fargo Rate competitors separated by only three points in their ratings; Filler, 843 and Raga, 840. At the end of game 4, with Filler up 3-1, the possibility of a tense, back-and-forth battle to the finish was still on the table. Raga, though, never chalked up more than two games in a row, as Filler kept the pressure on, winning eight of the next 12 games to claim the title 11-5.
Three-time winners of WPA Women’s World 9-Ball title battled for China Open title
Han Yu
For those of us on this side of the Pacific Ocean who may be unaware of them, we noted previously that Han Yu came to Shanghai looking for her third China Open title. Her opponent, Liu Shasha, was looking for her second. Shasha won her first in 2013, the year before Yu won her first. At that 2013 China Open, the two finalists, both from China (Shasha & Siming Chen), arrived having defeated the Fisher ‘twins’ to get there; Siming Chen surviving a double-hill match versus Kelly Fisher in one semifinal, as Liu Shasha was busy eliminating Allison Fisher 9-6 in the other one. Yu and Shasha came into this year’s China Open tied for the most WPA Women’s World 9-Ball Championship titles (3), one behind Allison Fisher’s 4.
Yu came into the final undefeated, having faced four other women from China and two from the Philippines. She survived two double-hill battles versus Shi Tianqi and Zhang Muyan in the double-elimination phase and downed the Philippines’ Chezka Centeno 7-2 in between. She entered Phase 2 with a 9-6 win over Liu Xiazhi, followed it with a 9-5 victory over the Phillipines’ Rubilen Amit and eliminated Chinese Tapei’s Chen Chia Hua 9-3 in one of the semifinals.
As luck would have it, the two finalists in the 2013 China Open met twice in this year’s China Open. It was Siming Chen who sent Shasha to the loss-side of the double-elimination bracket 7-5. Chen followed her over when she lost a subsequent, double-hill match against Austria’s Jasmin Ouschan. Shasha and Chen met for the second time in the loss-side’s final qualifying match and to no one’s surprise, it came to a double-hill final game. Shasha won it and advanced to single-elimination, where she defeated China’s Fan Langtong (5) and Bai Ge (7) before spoiling any hopes the Filler’s were maintaining of a husband/wife sweep of the event by defeating Pia Filler 9-3 in the other semifinal.
This final maintained a sense of drama through 70% of its potential 17 games. The two battled back and forth to a 6-6 tie. Shasha added one more to the total, while Yu chalked up three, closing it out at 16 games, 9-7, to claim her third China Open title.
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