Final Update From Big Red: And the New World Champion is...

Courtesy of E&R Walker Photography

The 2014 World Nine Ball Championships is now in the books and the winner is... Niels Feijen! from Holland. The semi finals were also played today and in a somewhat surprising result 23 year old Albin Ouschan defeated Chang Yu Lung, who seemed unstoppable yesterday. In the second semi-final the more predictable result came through as Neils Feijen defeated Elmer Haya. Both matches finished with an 11-7 scoreline. I was able to make it down and watch the final today at the Al Sadd stadium. The score was tight all the way with Feijen finally putting some distance between the two, taking a 10 to 7 lead. The match was characterized, as was most of the tournament, by strong tactical play and disciplined run outs. There was no room for free wheeling in the 4 inch pockets this week. The break and run again seemed fairly elusive for both players. Feijen was hitting the break with a little more consistency and came up with a few more shots after the break than Ouschan did.

Courtesy of E&R Walker Photography

In Ouschans defense he only missed one ball in the whole match, and he performed overall very well in his first World Final. With the score 12 to 10 for Fiejen in the race to 13, he missed a tough 4 ball but was fortunate to leave Ouschan snookered and in an offensive attempt to kick the ball in Ouschan ended up missing the ball completely. Feijen then ran out the remaining five balls for his first world title; well played and well deserved.
Overall this tournament had all the ingredients necessary to make it a well run and successful tournament. The venue was excellent, accommodations were great as well as the equipment. I guess the one thing that we can question is the prize money but seeing the improvement and genuine respect for the game the Qatar organization has shown, I believe that we can expect this aspect to improve as well. Thanks to everyone for following the blog this week and I will be back with some instructional articles very soon as well as other projects that you be seeing in the near future.

The Champ being interviewed photo by John Morra