Monday, March 30, 2009

Alcaide wins 2009 Italy Open

David Alcaide from Spain won the 2009 Italy Open for his first ever Euro Tour title.

In the final Alcaide defeated Germany's all-time Euro Tour leader Ralf Souquet 9-5. The victory was worth €5000 with Souquet getting €3300 for second place.

The semi-finals saw Alcaide trounce England's Craig Osborne 9-2 and Souquet scrape past countryman Marko Vogel 9-4.

Alcaide's previous best on the Euro Tour were three semi-final spots. It was Spain's second win with Samir Kaddur winning the 2004 Denmark Open. This was Souquet's 25th final, of which he has won a Tour-leading 15 times. The German legend is on a terrific run. His last six finishes is 5th, 1st, 1st, 5th, 3rd and 2nd.

Defending champion Darren Appleton (England) lost 9-6 to Mateusz Sniegocki (Poland) in the last 32.

The win took Alcaide from 15th to fourth in the Euro Tour Ranking. Losing finalist Souquet improved from second to first. Former leader Niels Feijen (Netherlands) dropped to second after a disappointing 9th place and Nick van den Berg (Netherlands) stayed in third.

The tournament was played 26-28 March at the Holiday Inn, Castel Volturno, Italy. It was the second event of seven on the 2009 Euro Tour. Next up is the German Open which runs from May 21-23 2009. It will be the 99th event on the Euro Tour but the first with 10-ball.

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Saturday, March 21, 2009

Jasper tops 2009 AGIPI Billiard Masters

Dick Jaspers from Netherlands won the 2009 AGIPI Billiard Masters.

In a high-quality final world No.1 Jaspers defeated defending champion Torbjörn Blomdahl (Sweden) 50-39. Blomdahl went out in front early helped by a run of 11, but Jaspers rebounded with some excellent play. His final average was 2.63 compared to Blomdahl's 2.05.

Belgians Frédéric Caudron and Roland Forthomme tied for third.

This win must have been extra sweet for Jaspers as he lost to 50-26 to Blomdahl in the final of last year's first running of the event.

Including bonuses Jaspers earned €20.550 for the victory. Blomdahl took home €14.450.

Players earned bonuses for runs of 10 or more and games won in 25 innings or less. Prizes were also awarded to the three players with highest general averages.

Jaspers had the highest run of the tournament with a 20 in the qualifying rounds. Caudron's 15 was the highest in the final stages. Kyung-Roul Kim had the highest general average of 2.043. Of those reaching the final stages Jaspers' 1.954 topped the list. Eddy Merckx from Belgium won two matches in only 17 innings, resulting in the highest special average of 2.94.

The event's final stage took place 12-15 March 2009 at the AGIPI Auditorum, Schiltigheim, France and was televised live on Eurosport.

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Monday, March 09, 2009

Sweden grabs ninth world three cushion team championship

2009 World Team Three Cushion ChampionshipFor the fifth time in a row and ninth overall Sweden won the World Team Three Cushion Championship.

The winning team once again consisted of Torbjörn Blomdahl and Michael Nilsson. In the final they won 2-0 over Belgium (Eddy Merckx and Roland Forthomme).

Germany and South Korea tied for third place in an event with teams from 18 countries.

Blomdahl has played on all the nine winning teams. Nilsson has "only" seven golds.

Sweden had a perfect 10-0 record in the event. They also had the highest general average of 1.769.

Of all the players Blomdahl had the highest general average of 1.969. He also had a 3.333 to top the single game averages. Belgium's Roland Forthomme had the highest run with 14.

The tournament was played 5-8 March at Festhalle Viersen in Viersen, Germany.

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Saturday, February 28, 2009

Three years and counting

Billiard Pulse is a gargantuous three years old today!

.. or rather yesterday, but I've been a bit lazy.

The biggest change since the second anniversary is the addition of polls. Other than that the concept is the same as one year ago:
  1. Provide links to current and upcoming events
  2. Write short reports from major events with references to related material
  3. Cover the billiard blogosphere and maintain a list of billiard blogs and other billiard related sites
This blog is still a "labour of love" for me. I hope you find it useful.

Thanks for visiting!

State of the blog

In total there's been 196 posts since the start and 56 in the last year.

They have been tagged 1306 times with 132 different tags. 98 (28 in the last year) posts have been tagged with pool, 44 (12) with snooker and 31 (10) with carom.

The link list in the right menu now contains 179 links, of which 123 are blogs. That's a slight increase since last year when the numbers were 170 and 118 respectively. I had to retire a fair share of those though.

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Sunday, February 22, 2009

Allister Carter bags first ranking win in the 2009 Welsh Open

Welsh Open 2009England's Allister Carter won the 2009 Welsh Open.

His opponent Joe Swail (N.Ireland) took the early lead with 5-2 before Carter stormed back with seven frames on the trot to win 9-5.

Anthony Hamilton (England) and Neil Robertson (Australia) lost out in the semifinals.

Carter received £35,000 for the victory and Swail got £17,500 for his runner-up spot.

Marco Fu (Hong Kong) had the highest break of the tournament with a 142. That earnt him £2,000.

Defending champion Mark Selby (England) lost 5-3 to Hamilton in the quarterfinals.

This was the first ranking title for Carter. Swail was also looking for his first title. The popular Irishman will be happy to finally have reached a final though. This was his 10th(!) semi-final appearance.

Carter improves from fourth to third in the provisional rankings. Swail jumps eight places, from 28th to 20th. The top two remain the same. Ronnie O'Sullivan (England) stays on top, followed by Stephen Maguire (Scotland).

The event took place at the Newport Centre, Newport, Wales 16-22 February, 2009. It was the sixth ranking tournament of eight on the 2008/2009 Main Tour. Next up on the snooker calendar is the Honghe Industrial China Open which starts 30th March 2009.

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Sunday, February 15, 2009

Feijen takes French Open for back-to-back Euro Tour titles

Niels Feijen from Netherlands captured the 2009 French Open for his second Euro Tour win in a row.

In the final the merited Dutchman defeated 15-year old Mario He (Austria) 9-4. The victory was worth €5000. Mario got €3300 for second place.

The semi-finals saw Feijen defeating Poland's Thomasz Kaplan 9-4. Mario overcame Tour legend Ralf Souquet (Germany) by the same score.

This was Feijen's first win in the French Open and fifth Euro Tour win overall, from ten finals. It moves him into fourth in the all-time list, only behind the German trio of Souquet, Oliver Ortmann and Thomas Engert.

It was Feijen's second straight win, having also lifted the trophy at the 2008 Costa del Sol Open. Souquet won the two events leading into that event. Before that Johnny Archer (USA) was the last man to win back-to-back titles, in 2000.

Defending champion Tony Drago (Malta) lost 9-8 to Rafael Guzmann (Spain) in the Losers Qualification.

The win took Feijen from second to first in the season's first Euro Tour Ranking. Losing finalist Mario improved from 184th to 96th. Former leader Souquet dropped to second and Nick van den Berg slipped to third.

The tournament was played 12-14 February at the Leader Billard Club, Paris, France. It was the first event of seven on the 2009 Euro Tour. Next up is the Italy Open which runs from March 25-28 2009.

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Sunday, February 01, 2009

John Brumback is Master of the Table in 2009 Derby City Classic

Derby City Classic 2009
John Brumback from the USA is the Master of the Table in the 2009 Derby City Classic.

The tournament is comprised of three events. Brumback was first in bank pool, top-ten in one pocket and 9th in 9-ball. He bested Johnathan Pinegar (USA) with only half a point, 175.5-175.

Here are the final results, with field sizes:

Bank pool (398): Winner: John Brumback (USA), $10,000; Runner-up: Rodolfo Luat (Philippines), $5,000
One pocket (333): Winner: John Schmidt (USA), $12,000; Runner-up: Scott Frost (USA), $6,000
9-ball: (341) Winner: Shane Van Boening (USA), $16,000; Runner-up: Lee Van Corteza (Philippines), $8,000

All-around title (Master of the Table):
  1. Brumback, $20,000
  2. Pinegar, $3,000
  3. Luat, $2,000
This was Brumback's first all-around-title and also his first bank pool crown. Earlier he had finished runner-up twice in banks. Schmidt and Van Boening also lifted their first trophies in the event.

Francisco Bustamante (Philippines) was the defending over-all champion but ended outside the top four this year.

During the week there were several more events being staged. For instance, Danny Harriman (USA) beat defending champion Darren Appleton (England) in the final of the Straight Pool Challenge.

The tournament ran from January 23-31 at the Horseshoe Casino and Hotel, Elizabeth, Indiana, USA. It was the 11th edition of the event.

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Thursday, January 29, 2009

Caudron takes World Cup season opener in Sluiskil

Frédéric Caudron from Belgium successfully defended the World Cup event in Sluiskil, Netherlands.

In the final Caudron defeated fellow Belgian Jozef Philipoom 3-0. The frame scores were 15-4, 15-13 and 15-11. Tying for third were Torbjörn Blomdahl (Sweden) and Tayfun Tasdemir from Turkey.

This was the Belgian's second consecutive win in Sluiskil and seventh World Cup win. He earned € 5.500 for the victory. Philipoom got € 3.500 for second place.

Last season's Tour champion Dick Jaspers (Netherlands) had the highest general average among the 150 competitors with 1.934. Kouji Funaki (Japan) had the highest single match average of 3.000. Nikos Polychronopoulos (Greece) had the highest run with 13.

Jaspers went out 3-1 to tournament surprise package Philipoom in the last 16. It was a high-class match with Philipoom averaging 2.400 and Jaspers 2.315.

With this being the season opener Caudron tops the World Cup Ranking. He's followed by Philipoom, Tasdemir and Blomdahl.

Caudron drops from third to fourth in the World Players Ranking. Philipoom leaps fom 40th to 16th. Jaspers holds on to the lead and Daniel Sánchez (Spain) stays in second.

The event took place 19-25 January 2009 at the Congrescentrum 't Meulengat, Sluiskil, Netherlands. It was the first of four events in the 2009 World Cup. The next event is in Antalya, Turkey, 5-10 May.

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