Tough start for Hungarian Nr. 1 player
Thursday, 31 May 2012: Niels Feijen (NED) showed no mercy with Balázs Miko (HUN) today. “The Terminator” blew him off the table with a clear 9:2 result. The match was determined by two things: Feijen's strong performance and Miko's mistakes. It can be stated altogether that Feijen deserved to win the match, also with that clear result. Feijen managed to get a better break shot on the table and benefitted from
this. When Miko broke the balls, usually no ball went in or the balls were clustered together. The safety battle that followed that situation was usually won by Feijen.
In the third rack, Miko committed his first fatal mistake. He was almost winning the rack when he overdrew the cue ball while pocketing the 8-ball. The cue ball scratched and instead of 1:2, the score was now 3:0 for Feijen. The next three consecutive racks went into Feijen's account. He ran out two of them ta take a 5:0 lead. In the 6th rack, Feijen made no ball on his break and left an open table for Miko. The Hungarian approached the table and played until the 5- ball was the ball on. He ran out of position and missed the 5-ball, including another scratch of the cue ball. What a catastrophe for Miko! He was only able to open his account and won the next
rack to make the score 1:6. Then Feijen took his time out. The next rack provided the spectators with a lot of safety play by both players. In the end, no wonder it was Feijen again to win the rack because he forced his opponent to make a mistake. Miko was able to snatch one more rack before Feijen closed the book on this match, taking the match with 9:2 and advancing in the winner's round. Miko needs to make his way through the loser's side but he also has to improve his performance if he wants to make it to the single elimination stage.
Other notable results from this morning include Tomasz Kaplan (POL) defeating Manuel Gama (POR) 9:8 in the first round. After that, Kaplan lost to Ivar Saris (NED) with 7:9. Nick Malai (ALB) won over local senior player Erich Matheis (AUT) with 9:5.
The event is be hosted by the European Governing Body for Pool, the European Pocket Billiard Federation (EPBF) and organized by International Billiard Promotion (IBP). For further information and reference please go to the federation website www.epconline.eu , follow us on twitter @EPBF_News or contact our press office.
