Sunday, March 27, 2011: The Dynamic European Championships in 8-ball are over for Ruslan Chinahov and Francisco Sanchez Ruiz. Both lost their matches in the loser's bracket this morning with 7:8 scorelines.
Watching the score sheet on the website, one can easily tell that it must have been a tough battle between young Spaniard Francisco Sanchez Ruiz and Russia's Roman Pruchay. Sanchez got the better start, taking a comfortable 3:0 lead over Pruchay. Roman tried to get back into the match but somehow Sanchez managed to maintain the pole position in this match. After being trailing 4:6, Pruchay got closer and overtook Sanchez, suddenly leading 7:6. Sanchez fought back and made it a hill-hill match, which Pruchay was able to win with the smallest gap possible, 8:7 in his favour.
Another shocking result is the 8:7 victory of Ben Gmach (ISR) over Ruslan Chinahov (RUS). Chinahov, who was clearly favoured to win this match, seems to struggle in order to reach his best game this week. Already in the straight pool division he had some unexpected losses. The junior World Champion from 2009 was never really in the position to overtake the Israeli. Whatever he tried, Gmach had the answer to it and kept his nerves together. In fact, Gmach was leading throughout the entire match with a gap of one, two or even three racks. Chinahov saw his chances when he tied the match at 7:7 after being down 4:7, but Gmach again took the lead. Ruslan fought back once more just to lose with the most frustrating score of 7:8 in the end to Gmach.
In the Women's division, a young lady from Slovenia drew the attention of the audience. Ana Gradisnik (SLO) was already trailing 1:4 and 2:5 to experienced Laetitia Dos Santos (FRA) when the French player missed an easy shot. Gradisnik was able to play up to her best and won game after game, winning against Dos Santos with 6:5. “I am so happy about this victory since I never got so far in a European Championship”, says the 14-year old girl from Slovenia who competes for the second year in the Women's division now. “I was shocked when I saw that I had a chance to get back after trailing 1:4 to Laetitia. I really got into gear and I felt so confident with my game that I somehow managed to beat her”, a happy Gradisnik says. “I want to go as far as possible now, but even if I lose in the next round I will be happy with my achievement here”.
And in other results this morning, Artem Koshovyi (UKR) defeated “Napoleon” Marcus Chamat (SWE) 8:2; Sara Iannini (ITA) wins over Veronika Hubrtova 6:5 and Austrian Gerda Hofstatter has to give her spot in the last 16 women winner's side spot to Tamara Rademakers (NED), losing 5:6.
The event is hosted by the European Governing Body for Pool, the European Pocket Billiard Federation (EPBF) and organized by International Billiard Promotion (IBP). For further information and reference please go to the event website www.epconline.eu or contact our press office.
