Left to right: M. Soufi, D. Alcaide, C. Siming and M. Keidl
The Dynamic Billard Klagenfurt Open has begun with some major upsets and several huge surprises.
One of the biggest upsets was presented by Chen Siming (CHN). The lady from China who took the Gold Medal at this year’s World Games won her first two matches in the open event, defeating Bruno Ernst (GER) 9:6 and then European top player and former World 9-ball Champion Daryl Peach (GBR) 9:5 in the second winner’s round. She will go up against local hero Albin Ouschan (AUT) tomorrow at 13:30 local time in the winner’s qualification round for a seat among the top 32 players single elimination stage of the event.
Another major surprise took place in the match between David Alcaide (ESP) and Karol Skowerski (POL). Spain’s Alcaide desperately needs points in order to make it on to this year’s Mosconi Cup team. He just recently won the Kremlin Cup in Moscow, Russia. Being the current #1 player of the Euro-Tour rankings, he could not get ahead of Skowerski. To the contrary, the Polish gave him a tough match and the encounter went to hill-hill at 8:8 after Alcaide had an 8:6 lead over Skowerski. Then in rack 17, Alcaide broke the rack. To his horror, he did not pocket any ball and left an easy 1-ball for Skowerski to the side pocket with a decent layout on the table. Skowerski played some good safety shots for Alcaide and managed to snatch the final rack off the Spaniard, winning the match by a hair’s breadth with 9:8. Skowerski will encounter Christian Sparrenloev-Fischer (SWE) in the winner’s qualification round.
Unheralded Marton Keidl (HUN) took care of the next surprise today. In winner’s round 1, he drubbed the winner of the last Euro-Tour in Leende, Ruslan Chinakhov (RUS) with a clear result as high as 9:2. In the next round however, Keidl found his destiny and lost 4:9 to Alexa Pecelj from Serbia. He now joins Chinakhov on the loser’s side of the draw.
Mark Gray (GBR), long time Euro-Tour #1 player, lost more or less without a trace with 6:9 to Marek Kudlik (POL). He will have another chance coming through the loser’s side though.
One very interesting player is Mohammad Soufi (SYR). He played his first Euro-Tour last month in Leende and has an exciting story to tell. In 2013, he flew from the war in Syria and finally ended up in Germany where he is residing these days. The likeable 23-year-old from Latakia, Syria, started playing back home when he was 8 years of age. Since he visits school in Rostock, Germany, and plays for Schwerte (together with Joshua Filler) he can only practice very few times. However, it seems to be enough for the young man. His greatest titles include Asian Champion 2012, Syrian Champion, 2nd place German Tour 2017 and runner-up in the Leipzig Open this year. His dream is to become a pool professional and he is still looking for supporters these days. After finishing 17th in Leende last month, Soufi came to Klagenfurt today and took his first three matches again. In his opening match, he defeated Pia Blaeser (GER) 9:3. Then he took down Max Lechner (AUT) 9:8 after a fiercely fought over match. Finally, he knocked out Ivar Saris (NED) 9:6 in the second winner’s round. His opponent in the winner’s qualification round tomorrow will be underdog Marcel Willing (AUT) who overpowered Jan Van Lierop (NED) today.
Tomorrow, the Dynamic Billard Klagenfurt Open will continue at 09:00 local time with matches from loser’s round 2.
Every day, one match from the events will be shown LIVE on the Facebook page of the EPBF for free. All Facebook users may check out the high standard of quality which is provided for all the events and see what the Kozoom members receive all the time. You can see all the matches live via www.kozoom.com who stream the whole event on 23 tables on the internet LIVE. The FB live matches are announced on the EPBF Facebook page every day. Results and schedules can be found at www.eurotouronline.com so why not come and check out all the LIVE action of the Dynamic Billard Klagenfurt Open.
The event is 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.eurotouronline.com visit us on Facebook or check out our youtube channel for regular news clips or contact our press office press@epbf.com.
