Dani Sanchez was a double gold winner in a series of tournaments held in Antalya, Turkey. First he and fellow team member Ruben Legazpi won the European Championship for teams. Then Dani repeated his winning performance again in the UMB World Cup that followed. Therese Klompenhouwer won the European Ladies Championship which opened the series of events.
UMB World Cup 2020 Antalya
The glorious winner that Dani Sánchez has always been, is back from being away. The Spaniard, 45 from Barcelona, four-time world champion in his career, won the World Cup in Antalya this Sunday afternoon in a final with Dick Jaspers (50-35 in 28 innings). It was the second great win for Sánchez after the European championship for national teams that he won last week with his countryman Ruben Legazpi. The last World Cup victory of Sánchez dates from 1063 days ago in Luxor, also in a final against Jaspers on March 26, 2017, in which the Spaniard set the world record general average with 2.777.
A new format made its debut in Turkey: 50 points in the K.O. stage, with a 30 second shot clock and automatic time-outs, no equalizing inning. Especially the 30 second clock took some getting used to for some players, but the spectators were mostly enthusiastic. A series of group matches, 16th final and quarterfinal culminated in a final day with four players left standing.
Final standing of the top 8 in Antalya (Average and high run):
After many years this is the first time a world cup event was not broadcast live on Kozoom. Due to a dispute between the partners the event was broadcast for free on YouTube where fans could watch the action on all eight tables. We don't know how long this dispute will lasst, but we recommend that all fans of 3-cushion billiards check out the videos available on the Kozoom International YouTube Channel.
Read more about Dani's world cup victory from our friends at Kozoom.
European Championship For Teams
The Spanish armada, famous for its punching force, has also shown its power display in billiards at the European Championship for country teams. The team with Dani Sánchez and Ruben Legazpi turned silver into gold in the final against the Turkish hometeam in Antalya. The match ended in a jump-off after Dani Sánchez had won his match against Semih Sayginer and Murat Naci Coklu had equalized against Ruben Legazpi. The Spanish golden tandem, second to the Belgians last year, won the match to 15 points in Scotch Double: 15-3.
The four finalists achieved high averages throughout the tournament. Dani Sánchez was the best of the four with 2,535 (180 in 71 innings) ahead of Semih Sayginer with 2,035 (171 in 84), Ruben Legazpi with 1,587 (173 in 109) and Murat Naci Coklu 1,453 (173 in 119). The Spanish captain also was the only player with the maximum score of 180 caroms.
Read more about Dani and Ruben's team championshipvictory from our friends at Kozoom.
European Championship for Ladies
The Dutch billiard stars have been leading all the way in the ladies three cushion in Europe and Therese Klompenhouwer is the undisputed champion. The leading lady in women's billiards showed her supremacy at the tournament in Antalya, where her eighth title in a row was never in danger. Karina Jetten, also from the Netherlands, was a wonderful second on stage. Belgian Jaimie Buelens and Spanish Estela Cardoso came to pick up the other main prizes.
Therese Klompenhouwer has demonstrated here dominance in ladies billiards with all here multiple records and wins in Europe. In Antalya she played the best match ever at the European championship (30 in 13) and improved the best run ever at the Europeans in the final.
Read more about Therese's European Ladies victory from our friends at Kozoom.
Congartutlations to all our winners: Therese Klompenhouwer - European Ladies Champion; Dani Sanchez and Ruben Legazpi - Euruopean Team Champion and Dani Sanchez - UMB World Cup Antalya 2020 Champion.
Thanks to Kozoom and UMB for statistics and pictures used in preparing this report.