To start the US Open, many players everyone loves and follows had great starts. One of the shockers was watching the performance of Joey Tate against Shane Van Boeing. Tate had a 5-1 lead at the beginning of the match, then Shane Van Boeing put the grind on and shifted into drive! Joey Tate made one big mistake and thought he was shooting the four-ball when he was hitting the purple five. Everyone knows that Matchroom’s ball colors are specific. I have seen this for the last year and some months that I have been putting out SPM Billiards Magazine. I have only seen one other person get the balls wrong, and that was The Drill Instructor in The Clinic, who comes on every Tuesday night at 8 Eastern. Don’t feel bad, Joey Tate. You played against Shane Van Boening, the World Champion, and you are learning!
The US Open has been full of so many twists & turns, which has kept the Open quite eliciting to watch; all the great known players to me have come out strong! Shane with his Golden Breaks! Jayson Shaw, Darren Appleton, Sky Woodward, Aloysius Yapp, Fedor Gorst, Filler, and many others!
We get down to the last 64 with two Ko Brothers in the game! Ko Pin Yi, Ko Ping Chung. Ko Ping Han made it all the way to the loser round three, losing to Kristina Tkach 8-3. The Ko Brothers have proven that they are a force to be reckoned with, Ping Chung and Pin Yi keeping the game exciting. Ko Ping Chung has risen above it, making a solid comeback from the loser's qualification round, beating Liu Ri Teng 9-8, taking him to the final 64. At the same time, his brother Ko Pin Yi made it through the winner's qualification and then on the Final 64 players beating Daniel Maciol 9-4, then onto the last 32 only to lose to Lee Van Corteza. But the middle Ko Brother Ko Ping Chung played David Alcaide winning 9-5. Now we go to the last 32 players, with Chung winning against Niels Fiejen 9-8, taking Ko Ping Chung to the last 16! What an exciting game as we watch Chung battle the table with Jani Uski 10-7. A beautiful game to watch! Ko Ping Chung played Eklent Kaci in the Quarter Finals and kept the game exciting to watch. Eklent took down Joshua Filler 10-1, and Chung has risen above now onto the Semi-Finals to play Max Lechner.
Before I go on, I must tell you how exciting this game has been and how serious I was in watching the game. On Thursday, I took my iPad with me to a doctor’s appt and to the dentist so that I would not miss the player's play. At the dentist, the little gal was cleaning my teeth while I watched Shane Van Boening playing Alex Kazakis, a nail-biter match with a crazy twist. I had to keep Matchroom Pool playing on my iPhone, holding the phone up so I could see the game and when I could not see, I could hear the commentators! Unfortunately, Shane lost to Kazakis 9-8, but the game was so exciting that I kept watching til the end.
I did the same thing yesterday had to watch the game with Ko Ping Chung taking my iPad with me to watch Chung play Jani Uski while sitting in the Apple Store to get my phone fixed. Now, this is dedication and love of the sport! You may laugh at me, but I thought that SVB had this, and I saw many other great players change the game's setting.
It is now Saturday, October 15th, and we have the semi-finals and the Finals to watch today! Will Ko Ping Chung take the title of Champion at the US Open? Today I had an appointment and had to take my iPad and phone with me to watch the semi-final. I thought for sure that Ko Ping Chung had the game. He made a golden break in the third rack and was playing great. I believe he was in the lead 8-3 at one point. I was hoping he would win. Max Lechner got the table after a scratch on a beautiful break. Lechner got ahead by 8-9 Chung, but the game was still going. Chung is on the hill and makes a beautiful jump shot on the four to have the cue ball knock to the nine ball and scratch in the opposite pocket, turning the game back to Lechner. Wow. Lechner took the game to play Ruiz in the Final. Ko Ping Chung could still smile in the face of Adversity! The rest is History. Ko Ping Chung still placed third with Carlo Biado, and my hat is off to Chung and Biado for playing great games.
Congratulations to Francisco Sanchez Ruiz for winning the Final over Max Lechner. All in all, it has been a fantastic US Open 2022. A special Thank you from 📸 takaimages Photo Credit of Ko Ping Chung at the US Open 2022!