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Headstring News
U.S. (Barely) Advances in World Cup of Pool
Sep 27, 2007, 1:45 PM
 | | Deuel buried the 9 in the case game to put the U.S. through to the final 16. |
At Matchroom Sport's World Cup of Pool in Rotterdam, Holland, the first match ended the way the U.S. team would have liked: They won. Everything else about the first-round thriller did not go exactly as planned for Rodney Morris and first-timer Corey Deuel.
Facing a sizeable underdog in Malta, the second-seeded Americans figured to coast past Tony Drago and Alex Borg. Instead, the U.S. tandem was pushed to the limit, needing a heroic run from down, 7-4, to win the hill-hill contest, 8-7.
The two men from Malta came out firing, running through the first rack in 90 seconds. Up 2-1, they again sprinted through the fourth rack, dropping the 9 just 64 seconds after the break.
Drago, who will face Morris in the Mosconi Cup, buried the 11th 9 ball of the match, putting Malta on the hill, 7-4. With a chance to run out, Borg could not pocket the 1. And, thanks to the winner-break format, he would not see the table again.
Deuel and Morris broke and ran the next three racks, edging Malta, 8-7. Drago and Borg, hugely entertaining for the packed house, faced a tough exit for the second straight year. (They were blanked last year against the Philippine powerhouse of Efren Reyes and Francisco Bustamante.)
The U.S. will face 15th-ranked Switzerland in the round of 16, scheduled for Friday at 8 p.m. local time.
In second-round play, Japan ensured there would not be a hometown winner by defeating the Holland A team of Niels Feijen and Nick Van den Berg, 8-7. In front of a raucous crowd at the Outland Nightclub in Rotterdam, the Japanese pairing of Satoshi Kawabata and Naoyuki Oi remained a step ahead of the Dutch boys, winning when the teams tied at 4-4, 5-5, 6-6 and finally 7-7.
The other second-round match went exactly as expected. Efren Reyes and Francisco Bustamante of the Philippines, last year’s champions, blanked Croatia, 8-0. The only drama proved to be some friendly teasing with the Filipinos up, 6-0. Reyes left Bustamante out of position, but “Django” executed a ridiculous kick shot to put the 7 in the side.
Bustamante and Reyes await the winner of the France-China matchup.
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