Evening all. At lunchtime Carlo Biado was 6–5 down to Mateusz Śniegocki and Fedor Gorst was trailing Marco Teutscher. Both are still alive tonight, and Biado has since knocked out the third seed as well. The Qatar World Cup 10-Ball is down to 16, and seven of them are Filipinos.
Doha: Biado's big afternoon
Carlo Biado won the last six racks to beat Śniegocki 11–6 in the last 64, then went straight out and beat Francisco Sánchez Ruiz 11–6 in the last 32. That's the Spaniard, one of Europe's Mosconi Cup qualifiers, gone from the one-life bracket.
Gorst made harder work of it. He got past Teutscher 11–10 in a deciding rack, then gave Mahmoud Charif almost nothing, winning 11–1.
The rest of the second wave of the last 64 (races to 11, per the Qatar Billiard Sports Federation live scoring):
- Robbie Capito 11–7 David Alcaide. Capito was 7–3 up at lunchtime and saw it home
- Mustafa Alnar 11–10 Bernie Regalario and Mahmoud Charif 11–9 Naoyuki Oi
- Also through: Sánchez Ruiz, Juszczyszyn, AJ Manas, Jefrey Roda, Hsieh Chia-Chen, Juan Carlos Expósito (11–9 v Grabe), Jundel Mazon, Dominik Jastrząb, Dương Quốc Hoàng, Daniel Macioł and Dimitrios Loukatos (11–10 v Ruben Cuna)
Last 32: four deciders and a few upsets
- Joshua Filler 11–8 Olivér Szolnoki. Filler lost his first match of the week and has now won four in a row
- Jonas Magpantay 11–7 Alex Pagulayan (the defending champion is still unbeaten) and Wojciech Szewczyk 11–4 Szymon Kural, last year's beaten finalist
- Jerico Bonus 11–9 Wiktor Zielinski. This morning Zielinski knocked out Kledio Kaci. This afternoon he went out himself
- Dương Quốc Hoàng 11–6 Robbie Capito and Daniel Macioł 11–7 Jefrey Roda. Two seeds out
- AJ Manas 11–5 Mustafa Alnar. The man who beat Filler on day one is gone
- Decided in the last rack: Rocky Tullao 11–10 Mario He, John Morra 11–10 Walter Laikre, Miguel Salvilla 11–10 Elliott Sanderson, which ends Sanderson's comeback run, and Konrad Juszczyszyn 11–10 Dominik Jastrząb
Last 16, Wednesday from 08:00 GMT: Magpantay v Szewczyk, Tullao v Morra, Salvilla v Bonus, Filler v Bongers, Biado v Juszczyszyn, Dương v Macioł, Gorst v Hsieh, and Mazon v Manas. With two all-Filipino ties, at least two Filipinos are guaranteed a quarter-final place. The race-to-13 final is on Thursday.
Blackball: a world final tonight at Heathrow
The men's singles at the WPA Blackball World Championships has its final. According to the CueScore draw, Gareth Hibbott beat Clint I'Anson 6–3 in this afternoon's semi, and Christophe Lambert beat Kevin Martin 6–2. The final is a race to 6 and is down for 20:00 UK time tonight.
Malta also had two pairs in today's doubles finals, according to the Times of Malta: Chaylon Castaldi and Matthias Debono in the Under-23 final, and Jake Castaldi and Dielyn Edwards in the Under-18 final. I hadn't seen either result when I filed this, so they'll be in the morning post.
Cho on his wife and the money
After Monday's seven-set win over David Martínez in Goyang, Cho Geon-hwi told the Korean press, as reported by Star News: "There's no special secret." He puts his form down to a calmer mind and the same work he's put in for more than five years. He also told a story about his wife. At a time when results weren't coming, she told him she would earn the money and he should "just play billiards."
The ₩100 million winner's cheque takes him past ₩600 million in career earnings, and his fourth title puts him level with Kang Dong-koong and Kim Young-won for third on the PBA's all-time list.
Where to watch
- Doha 10-ball: live on the Qatar Billiard Sports Federation YouTube channel, with live scoring from the federation (also mirrored by Rack 9)
- Blackball Worlds: draws and results on CueScore
- Nanjing: TNT Sports and HBO Max in the UK
Coming up
- Tonight, 20:00 UK: Blackball men's singles final, Hibbott v Lambert
- Wednesday 08:00 GMT: Doha last 16
- Wednesday from 15:00: Blackball finals day at Heathrow, with the presentation at 19:30
- Thursday 29 October: Qatar World Cup 10-Ball final, race to 13
- Saturday 31 October: the International Championship starts in Nanjing (to 7 November, per TNT Sports; Wu Yize defends, and O'Sullivan and Allen have withdrawn), and the PBA Team League's fourth round starts in Goyang
In the morning I'll have the Heathrow singles final and the Malta doubles results, and set up Doha's last 16.
Reggie
Feature image: “Philippine pool medalists KL 2017” by Primo Agatep for the Philippine News Agency, via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.
