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Blomdahl unbeaten star player in New York

07/21/2014

Published by frits bakker

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Torbjörn Blomdahl, the unbeaten winner of the Verhoeven Open in New York

NEW YORK - The Swede Torbjörn Blomdahl, in the era after Raymond Ceulemans the greatest champion in three cushion, has won the Verhoeven Open in New York. The unbeaten winner prevailed when the tension grew to the climax and bested all his rivals in a row. In the final match Blomdahl defeated Eddy Merckx, his last rival, 40-29 in 17 innings.

Blomdahl won for the second time in New York (his first in 2013), finished off with the maximum score (fourteen out of seven match points), took more than two average (2.188) and was superior in the matches against his major European rivals.

The Belgian champion Merckx was his main competitor in the final phase, but finally had to accept that Blomdahl was the best in the marathon race. The champion defeated on the final day consecutively Dick Jaspers, Frédéric Caudron and Eddy Merckx, an stunning demonstration of his world class.

The final between Blomdahl and Merckx was a repeat of the main match in the preliminary stage, when the two met each other in a thrilling fight. The Belgian won that match 30-29 after he had survived a match ball of Blomdahl. Merckx entered the main tournament instead of the Turk Murat Naci Coklu.

Four European players (Blomdahl, Merckx, Caudron and Jaspers) were qualified with two Colombians (Catano and Salazar), one Egyptian (Sameh Sidhom) and one Vietnamese (Vinh The Ly). The key players who were missing were Kyung-Roul Kim, Tayfun Tasdemir, Murat Naci Coklu and Raymond Ceulemans. Coklu played an excellent tournament, but was in a tough qualification group and unfortunately missed the final rounds.

The finals soon made clear that the most laureled names would dominate the final eight. Caudron started with a loss against Vinh The Ly, but then recovered quickly with some great matches. Only Dick Jaspers could not live up to the expectations. The Dutchman was in match points far behind his big rivals. He shone with a win against Merckx at the end when he was out for the top spots.

When Caudron was defeated by Merckx and Blomdahl in the fifth and sixth round, he had to give up his chances for the final victory was . The final match turned into a battle between the two giants of the tournament.

Eddy Merckx was after the second last round already two match points down, because he lost in an exciting match and despite a run of eleven to Jaspers 40-36 in 17. The tournament win, however, was still within his reach, also when Blomdahl defeated Caudron in the same round (40-31 in 19).

The tournament rule is that two players who finish with the same match points, have to meet in a playoff to point the overall winner. What meant that Merckx had to beat Blomdahl to come on twelve match points like Blomdahl.

The Swede didn't let get things so far. He remained stoically in the final, dominated the entire match and grabbed the tournament. The unbeaten series was realized with matches to 40 points in 17, 19, 18, 14, twice 16 and 28 innings. Frédéric Caudron had an extremely good finishing shot with matches in eleven innings and two times twelve innings.

Three players finished with averages over two: Blomdahl 2.188, Caudron 2.081 and Jaspers 2.031.
Frédéric Caudron recorded the highest run: 17. Alexander Salazar, who finished last in the tabel, shined with a run of sixteen, Huberney Catano with fifteen.

Dutch writer Bert van Manen was in New York to promote his book, The Blomdahl Era. He couldn't have wished a better winner.

The final score (match points, average, high runs):

1 Torbjörn Blomdahl 14-2.188-9
2 Eddy Merckx 10-1.934-11
3 Frédéric Caudron 8-2.081-17
4 Dick Jaspers 6-2.031-10
5 Vinh The Ly 6-1.567-13
6 Huberney Catano 4-1.466-15
7 Sameh Sidhom 4-1.437-7
8 Alexander Salazar 4-1.107-16.

Postions 9 to 16:

9 Murat Naci Coklu

10 Hugo Patino

11 Harry Pena

12 Nalle Olsson

13 Tayfun Tasdemir

14 Raymond Ceulemans

15 Robinson Morales

16 Lars Dunch.

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