Das holds off Feijen to earn Benelux Open Title

Serge Das

The 2010 Longoni Benelux Open took place at De Loft in Leuven Belgium with some of the top 10-Ball Players from all over Europe including the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxemburg, Germany, Switserland, Italy, Turkey and Bulgaria competing for nearly $15,000 in prize money.

Last year's winner, Andreas Roschkowsky, was an early elimination as he lost in 17th place and just barely finished in the cash. Eurotour Champion Nick Van Den Berg was eliminated in 9th place by former snooker World Champion Wendy Jans from Belgium.

The final came down to 2009 runner-up "The Terminator" Niels Feijen and Serge Das. Das' break was working extremely well in the alternate break format and he reached the hill first with a comfortable 7-2 margin. Feijen proved to be resilient though, and fought his way back to hill-hill. A dry break from Das offered Feijen the opportunity to clinch the match with a fairly open layout of the balls, but a bad positional shot on the 5-ball forced Feijen to opt for a safety. The outcome was less than perfect and Das was able to see the edge of the 5-ball from across the table. A do-or-die cut shot sank the 5-ball and rest of the rack proved to be no challenge to Das as he became the Longoni Benelux Open Champion for 2010.

The Longoni Benelux Open was organised by Daswan Promotions, together with poolroom De Loft, Clash X by Gabriëls, Iwan Simonis, Aramith, Serge Das Billiards and Stella Artois.