Shanghai, China- Allison Fisher is once again the last westerner standing in a sea of Asian female talent. Fisher has been dominant in almost all of her matches and has made it to the finals of the China Open in style. She had just finished runner-up two weeks earlier at the Women's World 9-Ball in China. The China Open is winding down with only 4 players left on the Men's side and down to the final 2 women in the ladies division. 64 men started the event and 48 ladies. Both divisions will have new champions this year as defending champions Thorsten Hohmann and Pei Chen Tsai have been eliminated. Heavy hitters such as Shane Van Boening, Rodney Morris, Mika Immonen, Ralf Souquet , Marlon Manalo, Niels Feijen, and many more are all eliminated as well. On the ladies side Ga Young Kim and Jasmin Ouschan failed to make it past the stage 2 qualifying rounds, and names such as Kelly Fisher, Rubilen Amit, Karen Corr, Yu Ram Cha as well as Chinese World Champs Sha Sha Liu and Xiaofang Fu are all gone.
On the men's side, Efren Reyes' hot streak from the last week's Predator International Championship was finally cut in the quarter finals as China's Haitao Liu defeated him. China's Yu Long Zhang eliminated American hotshot Van Boening after trailing 5-0 to win 11-9. He faces Filipino rising star Lee Van Corteza in the semi-finals with Haitao Liu facing Antonio Lining. Its Philippines vs China in both semi-finals.
On the ladies side, Allison Fisher started off with a shaky win 9-8 over Japan's #1 Kawahara and then she demolished Korea's Ga Young Kim 9-4. This put her in the final 16 elimination rounds where she struggled through a tough 9-7 win over Kelly Fisher, and then she found her stride in another near flawless match against reigning World 10-Ball Champion Rubilen Amit 9-3. She capped the night off in the highly anticipated showdown in the semi-finals against arch rival Karen Corr. Corr had a great streak of her own eliminating 17 year old wonder and former World Champ Sha Sha Liu in a 9-2 drubbing of her younger opponent and also a 9-1 beatdown on China's Doudou Zhou. But it was anticlimactic as Corr struggled with Fisher's flawless performance and lost an incredible 9-0 shutout.
"I really didn't expect that. It's always a dog fight with Karen, so that's what I prepared for. After the match I was like, did that just happen?", commented Fisher after the match. Fisher is now guaranteed to move into #1 spot in the World Rankings win or lose.
On the other bracket, Si Ming Chen of China also cruised through with easy wins over Amway Cup former Champ Chieh-Yu Chouh 9-5, and then former World 9-Ball Champ Yuan Chun Lin 9-5. Both ladies are playing top class and it looks to be a good finals between England and China, East vs West.
