24 Aug 2013 at 21:32 | Published by: Hans | Views: 9840 | News search

Evelyn Haberl cant really understand what has happened surrounded by her team from Austria  (Photo by Hans Bergström 2013)

The match play finals was played today in brilliant weather, even though it was quite windy. As usual the match play day is maybe the most exciting for the audience since there are some many decisive moments all along the day. As a photographer and filmmaker it’s a nightmare though when everything happens at the same time in different places.

The ladies category started with a first class surprise as yesterday’s winner Bianca Zodrow was defeated by Austrian Evelyn Haberl by 5-3. Evelyn then continued her winning streak and won against team mate Sandra Schwarz and then against Annika Dellmann, who won an all-German quarterfinal against Jasmine Ehm, in the semi-final. The Austrian, 33 years old Evelyn Haberl, making her international debut was all of a sudden in a World Championship final. Wonder if she thought of that this morning.

On the other half there was a battle between Czech Republic and Sweden in the quarterfinals. Sandra Bengtsson won against Jana Naklàdalovà in sudden death in maybe not the best match of the week containing lots of missed from both side. The other Swede-Czech quarterfinal was between Marielle Svensson and Eva Libigerovà. Also this match had to be decided using sudden death and this time the Czech girl won. So the semi-final was another Swede-Czech match between Bengtsson and Libigerovà.

Also this match went all the way to sudden death and again this was won by Sandra Bengtsson. So we had a high-odds final between Sandra Bengtsson and Evelyn Haberl. Bronze match stood between Dellmann and Libigerovà.

In the bronze match it was a hard battle between the two players and in the end they had to play the sudden death to part between them. After a bad shoot by Libigerovà on the romb Dellman didn’t miss the chance to take the bronze medal.

In the final both ladies played well on the initial 9 eternit lanes with 2 misses each and 2-1 in points for Evelyn. But then Evelyn won the two first lanes on felt gaining a grip of the match. But the next two lanes where won by Sandra making it only one down again. After winning one lane each Evelyn could ace lane 18 for the gold. Sandra was a quite happy silver medalist and Evelyn seemed mostly surprised and happy about the entire situation.

In the men’s category there was lots of high quality matches. But to be frank there was one match that people will remember for a long time. In the quarter final the two world champions from Stockholm Filiph Svensson and Walter Erlbruch met. Filiph having won against two Swiss (Raphael Wietlisbach and Mike Mann) and Walter having won against two Italians (Paolo Porta and Cristian Pinton). It’s well known that these two players are quite expressive in their game and also that they are not very fond of each other.

So expectation was high and what a game it became. Starting on the window on eternit, Walter gained the early grip at the 5 eternit lanes leading with 2-0 entering the felt course. But on the felt course Filiph was a demon this day. Acing 8 of 9 felt lanes he could get back into the game and after the bridge it was even. But strangely it was not until the next time they played the bride it was to be decided. So the last 7 lanes (3 felt and 4 eternite) was aced by both players with Filiph playing as player two all the time, strong mind you could argue. So sudden death was up. Then both players missed the window. Another 6 lanes with all aces and then two twos on the optical illusion and another two aces each they again came to the bride. Then Walter missed the first shot. The second shot was bouncing in both sides of the obstacle and lost speed and then rolled straight into the hole for a two. An almost unbelievable good outcome of quite bad shoot. Filiph step forward and took his shoot and when the ball was on the on green but not yet in the hole he said loud “Det spelar ingen roll..” meaning “it doesn’t matter..” referring to the lucky shoot by Walter and of course it was an ace to decide the match for Filiph. A remarkable ending on a match over 29 lanes with 21 of them being double aces. But it was only the quarter finals, very much like the incredible game between Marco Templin and Rudy Giroldini in Canegrate in 2007.

In the semifinals Dennis Kapke meet Marco Templin and Filiph Svensson meet Gunther Inmann. Kapke showed no mercy 14 of 16 lanes to win by 4-0 against Marco. Filiph had a tougher match against Gunther and won only by acing the last lane on felt to secure his final position.

So the bronze match was between the 2007 years world champions Marco Templin and the world ranking leader Gunther Inmann. Gunther played really well initially and led 2-0 after the eternit lanes. Then Gunther lost the first felt lane letting Marco in in the match again. Another 6 tied lanes later Marco got his chance when Gunther scored a 3 on lane 17. An ace from Marco took the match to a sudden death. On the third lane Gunther made a bad shoot almost not passing through the obstacle of the flat loop. Marco made no mistake and could secure the bronze for the home nation.

The final between Dennis Kapke and Filiph Svensson was for sure the right final this day. This was the two best players this day and Kapke like Svensson had played almost scary sharp in the matches along the way. The final started with a miss for Kapke giving Svensson a dream start. But then Kapke aced 13 of the next 15 lanes and made it too hard even for Filiph Svensson to follow. With two lanes to go he was in the lead by 3-1 and filiph needed to ace lane 17 to remain in the match. A close try but no ace made Kapke the winner and gold medalist. After a disappointing last year in Porto, Kapke had again a very good championship with two gold’s and a fourth place.

And poor Filiph Svensson has to travel back to Sweden with 3 silver medals beaten by different Germans all time. One might guess he is already thinking on his revenge in Lahti in two years’ time.

The 2013 Championships in Bad Münder has been setting a new standard in arranging an international competition. Excellent service on site, well managed, lots of audience, good media work and first time ever live streamed TV making this event a hard act to follow. And of course the big German success with 5 gold’s and 3 bronze medals made the big crowd happier.

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