Seoul, Korea- For the first time ever in billiards history, Pocket Billiards took on Carom Billiards in a team trickshot event. The Pocket Ball Team was captained by USA's famed Mike Massey while the Carom Team was captained by Turkey's Semih Sayginer. The Pool Team consisted of Shanelle Loraine of Guam, Shuji Nagata of Japan, and Sung Wook Choi of Korea. The Carom Team were Yu Ram Cha of Korea, Pil Hyun Cho of Korea, and Sweden's legendary Torbjorn Blomdahl. The event took place at KIA Motors Showrrom headquarters in Seoul.
"Carom trickshots and pool trickshots have inspired so many players with their magnificence. I thought it would be neat to have audiences see both at the same time with some friendly rivalry. And having each game's best man, Semih and Mike, would showcase it like no one's ever seen before." explained Charlie Williams, architect of this new event.
The format for the event involved 3 stages. The first stage each team would select a player to perform a shot on their home table and then the opposing team would select a player to duplicate that shot. Sayginer won the lag for the team and selected Blomdahl for the first shot. Blomdahl made the shot and a point for the team while Massey took on the challenge but failed to make the point for the pool team. Next Loraine matched up against Cha and both players scored a point for their team. Then Cho made a force follow 3 Cushion shot with Choi of Korea tying him with a perfect duplication for a point each. Finally Nagata of Japan made 6 balls in one shot with Sayginer dupicating it on his second attempt for the point. Score Carom Team 4 - 3 Pool Team.
The second stage involved one on one challenges with both players performing a shot on their own table with the other player having to duplicate. Only one player could score the match point for the team, so the first player to do their shot and duplicate the opponents shot would win. Massey defeated Cho in the first challenge. Next Sayginer defeated Choi with a magnificent looping masse. Then Loraine defeated Cha with a simple push stroke shot to tie the match, but Blomdahl defeated Nagata to put the Carom Team still ahead by one point 6-5.
The last stage was an individual performance by each player consisting of 3 shots each. The three judges included Peter Kim, CJ Media Executive and Cindy Lee , President of Dragon Promotions. The players were judged on number of attempts, impressiveness of shots, and entertainment style. Each player performed their routine to add to their team's scores and in the end Captains Sayginer and Massey scored the highest routine each with near perfect 8 points each out of 9 points. The Carom Team held their lead to win by one point 31-30!
The event was sponsored by KIA Motors, Coca Cola, and CYON Phones and will air on Korea's variety network XTM.
