Four days of Christmas event with a new field

ZUNDERT - The eleven-time winner Frédéric Caudron is missing this year, but the field at the Christmas tournament in Zundert is strong enough for a great battle. Jan van Kerkoerle and his team have managed again to invite an excellent field of sixteen players for the 39th edition of the traditional event in Biljartcentrum Den Hoek, starting today Sunday 27 December at 12.00 and continues on Monday 28, Tuesday 29 and Wednesday, December 30.

Four young players compete with twelve more or less experienced top players, of whom Eddy Merckx is the most successful and also three-time winner of the Van Beers-Son three cushion Christmas Tournament. The other top guns are Eddy Leppens, Martin Horn, Roland Forthomme, captain of the home team with Peter Ceulemans, Barry van Beers and Raymon Groot, who are divided over the four groups.

The matches will be broadcast live by Kozoom.com.

The draw for the groups with four players (the two best qualify for the quarter-finals) resulted in an interesting fight in all groups. Group A consists of two Belgians, Eddy Leppens and Peter Ceulemans and the Dutch Glenn Hoffman and Raimon Groot. Roland Forthomme, last year's semi-finalist, leads Group B with two Dutch, the national champion Jean van Erp and Gerwin Valentijn and the young German Master Dustin Jäschke.

Group C is headed by Eddy Merckx who is the favourite and plays against Barry van Beers from the Zundert team, the experienced Belgian Martin Spoormans and the only Frenchman Pierre Soumagne. Martin Horn leads Group D with Raimond Burgman, Thorsten Frings and the young Belgian Kenny Miatton as competitors.

In the long history of the tournament, the mini pentathlon in the early years from 1977 to 1989 was won by Raymond Ceulemans, Ludo Dielis and Christ van der Smissen three times.

The three-cushion tournament was won eleven times by Frédéric Caudron, three times by Torbjörn Blomdahl and Eddy Merckx and twice by Raymond Ceulemans.

The matches start today, Sunday, December 27th at 12.00 and will be continued on Monday 28th at 12.00 and ends with the last four group matches on Tuesday 29th of December. On Sunday and Monday, the last night matches are at 21.00.
On Tuesday, the four quarter-finals will be played at 19.00 and 21.00. Wednesday 30 December at 13.00 are the two semi-finals. The final is at 16.00.

All matches are played to 50 caroms.

The additional prizes for the highest run and shortest match are 250 euros.

Group A:
Eddy Leppens
Peter Ceulemans
Glenn Hofman
Raimon Groot

Group B:
Roland Forthomme
Jean van Erp
Gerwin Valentijn
Dustin Jäschke

Group C:
Eddy Merckx
Barry van Beers
Martin Spoormans
Pierre Soumagne

Group D:
Martin Horn
Raimond Burgman
Thorsten Frings
Kenny Miatton.