3-Cushion
SEOUL - The first tournament of the new Korean PBA billiards association, the Panasonic Open, has finished the preliminary rounds in Seoul and is starting the final rounds today. The 32 players meet in a knock-out to three sets won. The European players are with six from the total field of 128 participants. Frédéric Caudron, Filippos Kasidokostas, Savas Bulut, Adnan Yüksel, Birol Uymaz and David Martinez Bosch survived the two rounds that were played according to the Survival system with four players at the table. The other two non-Koreans are Robinson Morales from Colombia and Pedro Piedrabuena from USA. Kasidokostas recorded the best average in the second qualifying round: 2.600, best run 14.
The system differs in the matches from the tournaments played according to the UMB rules (world federation). When finished the two Survival rounds, first 64 players advanced, then 32 players remaining for the knockouts. After that, the playing system switched to three won sets of 15, but 11 points in the fifth set. All individual rail first shots (bankshots) count for two points in the score. The clothing of players also deviates from the rules in the World Cup circuit and international tournaments.
The final field for the knock-outs consists of 118 Koreans of whom Dong-Koong Kang and Jae-Guen Kim are the best known. The winner of the tournament, which is played in the chic room of the Kintex hotel in Seoul, earns 100,000.000 Korean won, is around 75,000 euro. The players who were eliminated in the second Survival, like Carlos Anguita and Juan David Zapata, receive 750 euros. The Europeans who were eliminated in the first round are Eddy Leppens, Javier Palazón, Tonny Carlsen, Jean Paul de Bruijn, Glenn Hofman, Pierre Soumagne, Kostas Papakonstantinou and Allan Schröder. They remain empty-handed.
The non-Koreans placed for the last 32 with the averages:
1 Filippos Kasidokostas 2.600
2 Robinson Morales 2.278
3 Birol Uymaz 2.238
4 Savas Bulut 2.056
5 David Martinez 1.952
6 Frédéric Caudron 1.917
7 Adnan Yüksel 1.571
8 Pedro Piedrabuena 1.130.
The averages of the European players who were out after the first round:
1 Glenn Hofman 1.778
2 Javier Palazón 1.400
3 Pierre Soumagne 1.300
4 Eddy Leppens 1.150
5 Tonny Carlsen 1.048
6 Jean Paul de Bruijn 1.111
7 Allan Schröder 0.957
8 Kostas Papakonstantinou 0.952.
Raymond Ceulemans was the guest of honour at the opening of the PBA Tour