Monday, July 16, 2007 Pinoys wiped out in pool contests
THE drought continues for the Philippines as Alex “The Lion” Pagulayan—the last remaining hope to win a Guinness 9-Ball Tour title—fell out of the contest following his heartbreaking 11-13 loss to Malaysia’s Ibrahim Amir at the Orchid Country Club in Singapore.
However, Amir’s impressive win over Pagulayan did not carry him through as he lost to Yang Ching-Shun of Taipei 11-8 in last night’s final.
Pagulayan, the last of four Filipinos who joined the Singapore leg, seemed to have a good game as he raced to an early 4-1 lead. However, bad luck strucked the 2004 WPC world champion on the sixth and seventh racks as Amir evened the game at 4-all.
Amir continued to play good offense resulting to a 7-4 lead just as Pagulayan ran out of luck.
But Pagulayan did not crumble as he was able to clean up the next five racks to regain the lead 9-7.
Amir was able to tie the game at 9-all when Pagulayan missed the 8-ball in the 17th rack.
Extra racks
The Malaysian and Pagulayan both reached the hill with a 10-all score, stretching the match to extra racks.
But the extended racks did not give any benefit to Pagulayan as he ran out of tricks and Amir showed good control of the table both on offense and defense.
With Pagulayan making too many unforced errors, Amir went to march the final round with a 13-11 win.
Just like Pagulayan, Warren Kiamco and Dennis OrcUllo, who were playing in the Predator World 14.1 Straight Pool Championship in New Jersey, failed to give the country another billiard title as they both fell out in the quarterfinals.
Kiamco lost to Huidji See of the Netherlands, 55-200, while Orcullo suffered an embarrassing 7-200 loss to Oliver Ortmann of Germany.
Both Kiamco and Orcullo along with John Schmidt and Thorsten Hohmman shared the fifth place finish and each received $2,400. (RCM)
