Cue masters crash out of 9-ball doubles

VIENTIANE – The billiards world champions from the Philippines watched helplessly as the lower-rated players got the lucky breaks and sent world legends Efren “Bata” Reyes and Django Bustamante, Reynaldo Grandea and Warren Kiamco out of the billiards competitions at the Don Chan Hotel here yesterday.

Reyes and Bustamante, a cinch to win at least one of the projected five gold medals in billiards and snooker, bowed to the Thai pair of Nitiwat Kanjansasri and Surathep Phoochalam, 7-4, in the preliminaries of the 9-Ball doubles and became the early casualties in the knockout competition.

“I didn’t know what happened,” was all Reyes could say.

The Thais raced to a 3-0 lead on good breaks in the alternate-break format, which also allows a player to continue playing as long as he pockets a shot. The Filipinos leveled the count at 4 but the Thais took the last three racks to win the match.

Grandea and Kiamco also bowed to Thais Praprut Chaithanasakun and Thawat Sujaritthurakarn in the quarterfinals of the English Billiards doubles, 3-0.

If it is any consolation, wins in the early rounds may yet result in all-Filipino finals in at least three events as two Filipinos were in the upper and half of the draws in their respective events.

The loss of Reyes, the former world 9-ball champion, and Bustamante, once ranked No. 1 in the world, left former world champions Ronnie Alcano, Alex Pagulayan and reigning world 10-ball titlist Rubilen Amit to carry the cudgels for the RP pool team.   – Gerry Carpio