Osaka, Japan- The All Japan Championships is drawing to an end with one day left out of the six total. Mika Immonen (FIN) is the last man standing out of the four pros Dragon Promotions sent. But as Immonen has proved in the past, one is all you need.
Rodney Morris (USA) suffered a first round loss and had came back with dominating wins over three Japanese pros with scores 9-1, 9-3 and 9-1. Then to enter the final 32 money rounds, he faced China's #1 Jian-Bo Fu. Morris rocketed to a 8-2 lead and then finally gave Fu an opening. Fu took more advantage of this chance then Morris would have liked as he strung that game plus five more racks. The format included no racks, just stickers that indicated where to place the balls with a circle indentures that made every ball frozen. This meant the corner ball would go in near 100% of the time. Incredibly at 8-8, Fu managed to not make a ball and Rodney ran the game out for the 9-8 win. Unfortunately Morris lost the next match to Marlon Manalo (PHI) with Manalo running 8 racks in a row to win 11-7 leaving The Rocket in 17th place tie.
Charlie Williams (USA) once again went the furthest out of the Americans finishing in the top 16. Williams on the winners side was 4-4 with Japan's Hayato Hijikata, and then a skidding 5 ball derailed him back to his chair and Hijikata would break and run out the rest of the set with Williams never leaving his chair. The Korean Dragon bounced back though with a commanding 9-3 win over Ando Masaka (JPN) to enter the final 32 man board. Then Williams proceeded with a 11-9 win over Taiwan's Po Cheng Kuo, runner up and 3rd place at the 2006 and 2007 World 9-Ball Championships. Williams was then defeated 11-7 by Japan's Satoshi Kawabata.
Yu Ram Cha and Xiao Ting Pan had a tough match with both players giving away easy games. Pan led early at 4-1, but Cha came back and tied at 5-5. Pan made a error that left Cha the 7,8, and 9 ball but a miscue on the 8 ball cost her the game and a missed 2 ball in the next rack ended Cha's run on the winners side. The losers side had Cha defeat Japan's Takahashi 7-3 but afterwards Cha faced Japan #1 Miyuki Fuke. Fuke led at 4-1 but Cha came back and soon the score was 5-4 favor of Fuke, but a near straight in 9 ball miss gave Kuo an easy combo. Fuke would win 7-5.
"I'm very disappointed in my play this week. I haven't been able to concentrate," said Cha.
Other notable defeats out of the event are Thorsten Hohmann (GER), Yuan Chun Lin (TPE), Francisco Bustamante (PHI), Dennis Orcullo (PHI), Max Eberle (USA) , Ga Young Kim (KOR), and Ralf Souquet(GER).
Mika Immonen is keeping his word thus far with a strong run undefeated. Mika defeated Marlon Manalo in the final match of the round and will advance into tomorrow's quarter finals against Satoshi Kawabata (JPN). Immonen has been in this spot many times and is now only 3 matches away from the title.
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