Team Germany
Quarter Final Results
Korea 9 – 5 Sweden
Germany 9 – 1 Philippines B 9
Thailand v Poland
Philippines A v Chinese Taipei
TEAM GERMANY, made up of Thorsten Hohmann and Ralf Souquet, did a job on the Philippines side of Efren Reyes and Francisco Bustamante to silence the big crowd at the SM Mall North and progress to Sunday afternoon's semi-finals at the PartyPoker.net World Cup of Pool.
9-1 was the score line and the Pinoys narrowly avoided the whitewash as they won the fifth game but the match was all Germany. Reyes looked completely out of sorts, making countless errors, while Bustamante who looked the hotter of the two in the earlier stages, soon joined his team mate.
The match had been a replay of their World Cup of Pool final in 2009 when Reyes and Bustamante had come from behind at the close to steal the championship off Germany.
The Germans were clinical and even though their breaking was noticeably unsuccessful, it ultimately had no bearing on the outcome of the match. They can now look forward to Korea to the semi-finals and it will take a good team to stop them.
Souquet commented, "It was very unusual as we only made a ball on the break two or three times but had to push out and Thorsten never made a ball on the break. We played well and Thorsten came up with the greatest shots when I missed position but besides that we didn't do much wrong.
"Efren was not on his game but that's the way it is but we put pressure on them as we performed well in the first few games. Playing for them in front of his home crowd there was more pressure on them than us."
Hohmann added, "Two days ago Efren had a problem with his stomach and he was not at 100 per cent, but they knew we would come out strong and we performed - it was very sweet revenge.
"We're here to go all the way and I'm now going to spend a couple of hours working on my break so hopefully I'll come back stronger tomorrow."
The PartyPoker.net World Cup of Pool features 32 two-player teams representing 31 nations – hosts Philippines have two sides. The total prize-fund is $250,000 with $60,000 going to the winning pair.
The opening quarter-final match saw Sweden's run in the competition come to a halt as they made far too many errors for a competent Korean side made up of Hwang Jong and Lee Gun Jae.
The Swedes – veteran Marcus Chamat and Thomas Mehtala – had completed a marvellous comeback victory yesterday when turned over Switzerland. But they had no such luck today as the Koreans ran out 9-5 victors.
Mehtala was the guilty party too often as he made unforced errors and the Koreans feasted on them to open up a 6-2 lead. The Swedes could never make any impact on that and Korea goes on to play Germany for a place in the final.
The two Korean players are a sharp contrast; the younger, Hwang Jong is one of the speedier players in the competition while his team mate Lee is one of the slowest. It seems to work though although they will need to find a couple of extra gears if they are to fend off the deadly Germans.
The 2011 World Cup of Pool is sponsored by PartyPoker.net, the world's leading online poker school. Cloth is supplied by Iwan Simonis, Super Aramith balls by Saluc, tables by Star Xing Pai and the Official Cue is Predator.
Results to date –
Last 16
Taiwan 8 – 7 Italy
Philippine 8 – 6 Canada
Germany 8 – 3 Malaysia
Korea 8 – 6 Japan
Thailand 8 – 4 Estonia
Poland 8 – 3 Singapore
Sweden 8 – 6 Switzerland
Philippines B 8 – 5 India
Round One
Chinese Taipei 8 – 4 Russia
Italy 8 – 6 Hong Kong
Singapore 8 – 7 USA
Philippines A 8 – 2 Austria
Estonia 8 – 6 England
Thailand 8 – 4 Holland
Germany 8 – 0 Australia
Malaysia 8 – 6 France
India 8 – 7 Finland
Philippines B 8 – 4 Kuwait
Korea 8 – 5 Spain
Japan 8 – 3 Croatia
Switzerland 8 – 5 China
Sweden 8 – 7 Indonesia
