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Beautiful people outside the Multi's arena

01/12/2017

Published by frits bakker

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© © Dirk Acx
Eddy Merckx in a good mood after he won his group

BLANKENBERGE - The wonderful lady in red is the wife of the president, the young blonde lady with the baby on her arm a staunch fan of Eddy Merckx and in the VIP stands, Jessica (Fred's wife) and Andrea (Eddy's wife) are talking about all kind of daily things. Will it be about billiards, fantastic shots on the tables, their many exotic trips or just about the alleged escapades of the strange Mr. D. Trump?

Lots of good folk outside the arena on Wednesday, the fourth day of the Multi's, but billiard is the main course in the Blankenberge Casino. It is the second last day of the preliminaries in three cushion, with Roland Forthomme and Eddy Merckx as group winners and Kenny Miatton (extremely strong in his match against Forthomme) and Tom Persyn who qualify as the runners-up. Martin Spoormans makes his entrance into the one cushion and returns today in three cushion, with among others Frédéric Caudron as his opponent. Will it be his last championship here, as he has hinted? With 'De Martin' you never know, especially when there are so many wonderful ladies in the stands at the Belgian championship...

Andy de Bondt retains his status as the leader in the free game-group, Eddy Leppens and Patrick Niessen are topping the 47/2 with four match points, Maarten Janssen the 47/1 with four out of three, but Niessen and Leppens only played one match so far. Niessen and Deraes lead the 71/2 with 4 points, Leppens the one cushion with four points, but Caudron entered the tournament as a whirlwind. He won his first one cushion match against Maarten Janssen 150-9 in four innings, thanks to a flawless run of 101.

Today, Thursday, there is a great schedule again in the classic games, with matches between Caudron and Niessen in one cushion (20.30, final round), Deraes and Janssen (71/2), Leppens-Devos (47/1) and Leppens-Janssen (one cushion) and Niessen-Devos (47/2 and 47/1).

The three cushion session reached its peak in the match between Roland Forthomme and Kenny Miatton, two teammates in the Belgian league. The match came to life when Forthomme was leading 22-17 and Miatton attacked with a magnificent run of eleven to 28-22 in his favor. Forthomme woke up, replied with 10 and was about to finish the match. The final shot of Miatton however, was slightly stronger. The player from Maasmechelen, a great promise for years already, took victory with 40-39 in 21 innings.

Despite his loss, Forthomme finally won the group, because Miatton couldn't continue his good play and lost to Ivan Stitschinsky (40-29 in 34), who played well in that last one, but finished third on average.

Eddy Merckx had a sort of walk-over in the other group with a traditional solid start and victories over De Laet, Persyn and Daniels in 32, 34 and 26 innings. In the last, against Rudy de Laet, he was already close to his good form. Tom Persyn won his matches against De Laet and Daniels in 51 and 38 innings and shared the final group for the knockouts.

The ranking in the three cushion groups:

Group 2:
1 Eddy Merckx 6-1.304-6
2 Tom Persyn 4-0.834-6
3 Ronny Daniels 2-0.867-6
4 Rudy de Laet 0-0.779-5

Tom Persyn, the runner-up in the Merckx-group

Group 4:
1 Roland Forthomme 4-1.608-10
2 Kenny Miatton 4-1.267-11
3 Ivan Stitschinsky 4-1.000-8
4 Henk Blauwblomme 9-0.847-5.

Roland Forthomme, group-winner despite his loss against Miatton

Kenny Miatton shone with a magnificant win over Forthomme

Leslie Menheer, speaker, entertainer and interviewer in the arena

 

Jessica and Andrea, what did they speak about: beautiful billiards, or just the alleged escapades of that strange Mr D. Trump?

Who is this wonderful lady in red?

Wonderful people inside: Milenca (huge Merckx fan) and her little child

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