The 2006 World Cup of Pool (also known as the 2006 PartyPoker.com World Cup of Pool for the purposes of sponsorship) was a professional nine-ball pool competition, the first

World Cup of Pool The World Cup of Pool is an annual international single-elimination tournament for doubles teams in nine-ball pool competition. The Philippines holds the record for World Cup wins, winning the title on four occasions. In 2023, they also became t ...

, a

scotch doubles The following is a glossary of traditional English-language terms used in the three overarching cue sports disciplines: ''carom billiards'' referring to the various games played on a billiard table without ; ''pool'', which denotes a host of ga ...

knockout championship representing 32 national teams. The event was held at the Newport Centre in Newport, Wales, from 22 to 27 August 2006. The event was held as a

single-elimination A single-elimination knockout, or sudden-death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of a match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final match-up, w ...

tournament, for a total prize fund of $250,000 with $60,000 being awarded to the winner. The tournament was organised by

Matchroom Sport Matchroom Sport is a UK-based sporting event promotions company founded by Barry Hearn and run by him and his son Eddie Hearn. It first came to attention in the sports of snooker and boxing and is also involved in pool (cue sports), pool, bowl ...

, sponsored by poker website Partypoker, and broadcast on Sky TV. The event was won by the Filipino team of

Efren Reyes Efren Manalang Reyes (born August 26, 1954) is a Filipino professional pool player. A winner of over 100 international titles, Reyes was the first player to win world championships in two different pool disciplines. Among his numerous title ...

and

Francisco Bustamante Francisco Bustamante (born December 29, 1963) is a Filipino professional pool player from Tarlac, Central Luzon and the 2010 World Nine-ball Champion, nicknamed "Django", after the lead character of the 1966 film of the same name,Earl Strickland Earl Strickland (born June 8, 1961) is an American professional pool player who is considered one of the best nine-ball players of all time. He has won over 100 championship titles and three world titles. In 2006 he was inducted into the Billiard ...

and

Rodney Morris Rodney Morris (born November 25, 1970, in Anaheim, California) is a professional pool player, nicknamed "the Rocket". In 2016, he was inducted into the Billiard Congress of America Hall of Fame. Morris won the 1996 U.S. Open Nine-ball Champions ...

13–5 in the final. The event saw multiple world pool champions in the field, as well as

snooker Snooker (pronounced , ) is a cue sport played on a rectangular Billiard table#Snooker and English billiards tables, billiards table covered with a green cloth called baize, with six Billiard table#Pockets 2, pockets: one at each corner and ...

world champions in

Steve Davis Steve Davis (born 22 August 1957) is an English retired professional snooker player who is currently a Sports commentator, commentator, DJ, electronic musician and author. He dominated professional snooker in the 1980s, when he reached eight ...

and

Ronnie O'Sullivan Ronald Antonio O'Sullivan (born 5 December 1975) is an English professional snooker player. Widely recognised as one of the most talented and accomplished players in snooker history, he has won the World Snooker Championship seven times, a m ...

. The unseeded Vietnamese team of

Nguyen Thanh Nam Nguyễn (阮) (sometimes abbreviated as Ng̃) is the most common surname of the Vietnamese people. Outside of Vietnam, the surname is commonly rendered without diacritics as ''Nguyen''. By some estimates 30 to 39 percent of Vietnamese peopl ...

and Lương Chí Dũng reached the semi-finals, where they won $8,000 each, three-times the country's national average wage.

Format

The 2006 World Cup of Pool was a pairs

nine-ball Nine-ball (sometimes written 9-ball) is a discipline of the cue sport pool. The game's origins are traceable to the 1920s in the United States. It is played on a rectangular billiard table with at each of the four corners and in the middle o ...

tournament played at Newport Centre in Newport, Wales. The tournament was played between 22 and 27 August 2006 as

, with players taking shots alternatively. Matches were played as a -to-nine until the final, which was played as a race-to-thirteen. The tournament was a

bracket, consisting of 32 teams. The event was played with the alternating system, as to the traditional ''winner breaks'' as seen in other nine-ball events. The tournament was the inaugural

event, sponsored by Partypoker, and created by

. The event was filmed and broadcast by Matchroom Sport across 31 single hour programs on Sky TV.

Prize fund

A total of $250,000 was made available for the prize pool, with $60,000 being awarded to the winning team. Money earned by the team was shared between their players. A breakdown of prize money is shown below:

Teams

The field consisted of 32 teams, with England having two teams. The participating teams are shown below, numbers in brackets denote seeded teams. * (Luc Salvas and Tyler Edey) (8) * (Philipp Stovanovic and Ivan Kralj) (15) * (Wang Hung-hsiang and

Yang Ching-shun Yang Ching-shun (; 3 April 1978 – 6 December 2023) was a Taiwanese professional Pocket billiards, pool player, nicknamed "the Son of Pool". Biography Yang won the nine-ball event of the 1998 Asian Games against then World Pool champion Kunihi ...

) (5) * ( Roman Hybler and Michal Gavenciak) * A ( Raj Hundal and

) (13) * B (

and

Daryl Peach Daryl Peach (born 8 March 1972) is an English professional pool player, from Lancashire, who resides in Blackpool, England. He won the 2007 WPA World Nine-ball Championship, where he defeated the Philippines' Roberto Gomez 17–15 in the final ...

) * (

Mika Immonen Mika Immonen (born 17 December 1972) is a Finnish professional Hall of Fame pool player, nicknamed "The Iceman." Career Immonen was born in London, England, and began playing Snooker at an early age and was known to have made several century br ...

and

Markus Juva Markus Juva (born 4 June 1975 in Helsinki, Finland) is a professional Finnish pool player. At the 2007 World Cup of Pool, Juva and partner Mika Immonen reached the final, only to lose 11–10., and competed in the event on four other occasions. ...

) (7) * ( Thomas Engert and

Oliver Ortmann Oliver Ortmann (born 11 June 1967) is a German professional pool player from Gelsenkirchen. Ortmann is a three-time world champion, winning the 1995 WPA World Nine-ball Championship and the 2007 and 2010 World Straight Pool Championship. Ortman ...

) (4) * (Lee Chenman and Kong Man-ho) * (Vilmos Foldes and Gabor Solymosi) * (Dharminder Lilly and Alok Kumar) * (Imran Ibrahim and Ricky Yang) * (

Tommy Donlon Tommy may refer to: People and fictional characters * Tommy (given name), a list of people and fictional characters * Tommy Atkins, or just Tommy, a slang term for a common soldier in the British Army * Tommy Giacomelli (born 1974), Brazilian fo ...

and Paddy McLaughlin) * ( Fabio Petroni and Angelo Millauro) (10) * (Maasaki Tanaka and Satoshi Kawabata) (12) * (Jeong Young-hwa and Lee Gun-jae) (14) * (Patrick Ooi Fook Yuen and Ibrahim Bin Amir) (16) * (

Tony Drago Tony Drago ( ; born 22 September 1965) is a Maltese former professional snooker and pool player. Known for his speed around the table, during his snooker career he won two professional titles: the 1993 Strachan Challenge Event 3 and the 1996 ...

and

Alex Borg Alex Borg (born 5 June 1969) is a Maltese former professional snooker player. Borg currently resides in Mellieha, Malta. Career Borg first turned professional in 1991, and regularly appeared as a wild card in the Malta Grand Prix, where throug ...

) * (

Nick van den Berg Nick van den Berg (born 24 May 1980) is a Dutch professional pool player. He was the runner up at the 2005 WPA World Eight-ball Championship, where he lost to Wu Chia-ching 11–5 in the final. He is a multiple time winner of events on the Eu ...

and

Niels Feijen Niels Feijen (born 3 February 1977, The Hague) is a Dutch professional pool player, from the Hague. His nickname is "the Terminator". In 2014 he won the WPA World 9-ball championship. Career In 2001, Feijen reached the finals of a nine-ball to ...

) (2) * (

and

Francisco Bustamante Francisco Bustamante (born December 29, 1963) is a Filipino professional pool player from Tarlac, Central Luzon and the 2010 World Nine-ball Champion, nicknamed "Django", after the lead character of the 1966 film of the same name,Radosław Babica Radosław Babica (born 18 July 1979) is a Poland, Polish professional Pool (cue sports), pool player from Kielce, who reached number 12 in the World Pool-Billiard Association world rankings in 2009. Career Babica final reached the European Pool ...

and Mariusz Rote) (9) * (Fahad Mohammadi and Bashar Hussain) * ( Konstantin Stepanov and Konstantin Zolotilov) (11) * (Michael Valentine and Pat Holtz) * (Chan Keng Kwang and Toh Lian Han) * (David Anderson and Yulan Govender) * (

David Alcaide David Alcaide Bermúdez (born 14 December 1978) is a Spanish professional pool player. He is a two-time winner of the World Pool Masters, winning the 2017 event, defeating Jayson Shaw 8–7 in the final, and again in 2019 defeating Alexander K ...

and Rafael Guzman) * (

Marcus Chamat Marcus Chamat (; born 6 May 1975) is a Swedish language, Swedish professional eight-ball and nine-ball Pocket billiards, pool player. He was Nickname, nicknamed "Napoleon" due to his personality and standing at tall. He is a two time European Po ...

and

Tom Storm Tom Storm (born 16 March 1965 in Borlänge, Sweden) is a former Swedish professional pool player. Storm was the runner-up at the 1996 WPA World Nine-ball Championship. Storm represented Europe at the Mosconi Cup twice, in 1994 and 1995. Storm ...

) (6) * (Tepwin Arunnath and Amnuayporn Chotipong) * (

Earl Strickland Earl Strickland (born June 8, 1961) is an American professional pool player who is considered one of the best nine-ball players of all time. He has won over 100 championship titles and three world titles. In 2006 he was inducted into the Billiard ...

and

) (3) * (Nguyen Thanh Nam and

Luong Chi Dung Liang () is an East Asian surname of Chinese origin. The surname is often transliterated as Leung (in Hong Kong) or Leong (in Macau, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, and the Philippines) according to its Cantonese and Hakka pronunciation, Neo / L ...

) * (

Rob McKenna Robert Marion McKenna (born October 1, 1962) is an American lawyer and politician who served as the 17th attorney general of Washington from 2005 to 2013 after serving on the Metropolitan King County Council from 1996 to 2005. A member of the ...

and Ben Davies)

Summary

Early rounds (first–second round)

The first round was played between 22 and 24 August. The Filipino team of

and

partnered

for the first time in the event, but still defeated the Korean team 9–6. Davis commented post-match, "It was hard to get ahead – every time we took the lead they got back into it but we stuck at it and came good in the end." The second England team, however, lost on a to Spain. Raj Hundal and

trailed 0–4 after just 20 minutes, but tied the match at 7–7. O'Sullivan on the break in rack 15, but

Rafael Guzmán Rafael Guzmán Hernández (9 April 1986 – 18 October 2011) was a Mexican professional boxer. Guzmán is the former WBC FECARBOX Super Featherweight, WBC Mundo Hispano, and WBC FECARBOX Lightweight Champion. Early life Guzmán started his ama ...

of Spain missed a shot on the to allow the English team to lead 8–7. The Spanish side however took the next two frames to win the match. In travelling to the event,

Luc Salvas Luc Salvas (born November 21, 1962) is a Canadian professional pool player. His quick-paced speed pool play has earned him the nickname "Machine Gun". Born in Yamaska, Quebec, in 1962, he won the first International Speed Pool Challenge and t ...

lost his , so he and Canadian partner

Tyler Edey Tyler Edey (born February 29, 1980) is a Canadian pocket billiards player. He reached the first place at the 8-Ball Championship. During the 2006 WPA Men's World Nine-ball Championship he survived the group stages, the round of 64 and the roun ...

shared a cue, but still won 9–5 over Thailand. Sweden and Hong Kong featured a deciding rack. Hong Kong trailed 1–4, 6–2 and 8–5, but tied the match at 8–8. With just the final two balls remaining, Lee Chenman made a difficult to allow the Hong Kong team to win 9–8. Chenman later commented that the

odds In probability theory, odds provide a measure of the probability of a particular outcome. Odds are commonly used in gambling and statistics. For example for an event that is 40% probable, one could say that the odds are or When gambling, o ...

of 2/1 against the team winning prior to the match pushed them to victory. In their match against the host Wales team, the Germany team of Thomas Engert and

took an early 6–0 lead, and won 9–2. The Japanese team received a

walkover John Baxter Taylor and William Robbins (athlete)">William Robbins to refuse to race in protest. A walkover, also W.O. or w/o (originally two words: "walk over"), is awarded to the opposing team/player, etc., if there are no other players avail ...

against Indonesia, as the later failed to secure visas to compete at the event. The unseeded Vietnamese team of

and Lương Chí Dũng won 9–8 over Croatia in a match full of errors. The Dutch team of

and

defeated the Scottish pair 9–5. The second round was played 24 and 25 August. The remaining United Kingdom team, the England B side were eliminated by the US team of

and

. The teams were tied at 3–3 but the US team won six straight racks to win 9–3. Fifth seed Taiwan were tied at 4–4 with Japan, before winning the next five racks to win 9–4. Hong Kong completed their second 9–8 win, this time over 11th seed Russia. The Canadian side trailed 4–7, but won the next four racks to lead 8–7 over the Czech team. However, the Czechs won the final two racks to reach the quarter-finals. The Filipino team defeated Malaysia 9–5.

Later rounds (quarter-finals–final)

The quarter-finals were played on 26 August. The Vietnam team of Nguyen Thanh Nam and Lương Chí Dũng won their third match in the tournament 9–8, this time over the Italian team. The Italians led the match 8–7, but a and

table Table may refer to: * Table (database), how the table data arrangement is used within the databases * Table (furniture), a piece of furniture with a flat surface and one or more legs * Table (information), a data arrangement with rows and column ...

-length shot on the by Nguyen allowed the Vietnam team to win the match. The German team of Ortmann and Engert defeated the Taiwanese team 9–4. The Philippine team (and top seeds) defeated the Czech Republic 9–6. The Filipino team won the first three frames, but won just one of the next seven to trail 4–6. However, they then won the next five frames to win the match. Bustamante called the match "scary", and said that they had "played badly". With pre-tournament odds of 150/1, the Hong Kong team were defeated 3–9 against the American team. The semi-finals were played 27 August. The first semi-final was held between the Philippines and Germany. The Filipino team led 5–4, and won rack 10 with a fluke, escaping from a snooker and took the next to lead 7–4. The German team won the next three racks to tie the match 7–7. The Philippines won the next rack, before Ortmann missed banking the 2-ball in rack 16 and the Filipino team cleared the table to win 9–7. The second semi-final was held between the Vietnam and US teams. The unseeded Vietnam team had already beaten three seeded teams to get to the semi-finals, and won the opening rack. They then came from behind to tie the match at 3–3, before the US team won three racks in a row. The US team also had a three rack advantage at 8–5 to go to the . Nguyen made a difficult shot on the 9-ball in rack 14, and also won rack 15 to trail 7–8. Breaking to go , Nguyen missed a shot with the cue behind his back on the allowing the US team to take the rack and win 9–7. Even in losing, the pair won $8,000 each, three-times the national average wage in Vietnam. The final was contested on the evening of the same day as a race-to-13 racks, between Efren Reyes and Francisco Bustamante of the Philippines and Earl Strickland and Rodney Morris of the US. The final was attended by a crowd of 900 people, the majority of which were

Expatriate An expatriate (often shortened to expat) is a person who resides outside their native country. The term often refers to a professional, skilled worker, or student from an affluent country. However, it may also refer to retirees, artists and ...

s supporting the Philippines. With the scores tied at 4–4, the Philippine team won 7 consecutive racks, to take a 11–4 lead, and eventually win the final 13–5. Morris said of the match: "That was pretty disappointing. After 4–4 it didn't go our way although the match was closer than the score suggested but when it went to 7–4 we were both pretty deflated and felt it slipping away. We never really got a clear shot off the break and it was a tough hill to climb but they played great – the way they were supposed to so congratulations to them." Bustamante commented that the event win was due to his partner's play saying, "Efren played lots of unbelievable shots; some of them I've never seen in my life! That's why we won."

Tournament bracket

Below is the results from the event. Teams in bold denote match winners. Numbers to the left of teams represents the team's seedings.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:World Cup Of Pool 2006

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