Ivar Saris wins 1st One Pocket Series Open 2018 – Action already started Friday
Last weekend was an eventful weekend for us Dutch One Pocketeers. On Sunday the One Pocket Series 2018 in the Netherlands kicked off in my favorite pool hall, one pocket epicenter of the Netherlands, and main sponsor, Hague 5. The action however, already started on Friday night. Saturday was even better and the tournament, which Ivar Saris would win, didn’t even start yet! For those who are not familiar with the One Pocket Series yet, read ‘Everything you need to know about the One Pocket Series 2018‘.
Friday
On Friday the first non-Benelux (Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany) participant of the One Pocket Series arrived from Denmark. He came all the way down here to see the love for one pocket in the Netherlands himself. How overwhelmed he was did say enough to us. For me, the night started off with a one pocket race to 3 against Alex Lely giving me 9-7. The rest of the night was full of bank pool and a bank ringgame with some locals and our new Danish friend.
Saturday
You probably already know that Alex Lely played a straight pool race to 1000 against the German Christoph Reintjes with €8000 in the middle. It was a 17 hour battle without high breaks, but it was a good grind and that’s what Alex loves. That’s his drug. He eventually won 1000-840. After he went to his hotel for a few hours he had to be back at Hague 5 again to play the 1st One Pocket Series Open 2018.
Alex Lely (left) and Christoph Reintjes (right)
The rest of Hague 5 was of course filled with players preparing for the tournament next day. The two German participants came to look for some action and Tim De Ruyter couldn’t wait either. He walked into Hague 5 right after he came back from the Eurotuor in Austria. Everywhere you looked people were playing one pocket. Great atmosphere. Good vibes. Ivar Saris took the night off after he came home from the Eurotour, which clearly was a good decision.
Sunday – 1st One Pocket Series Open 2018
Tournament day was a successful day, except for a few technical problems with our first try with a live stream. The event was sold out weeks before it even started and we ended up with a waiting list of 14 players. You could almost say it’s going too well! It was a day full of shoot outs and monster grinds. The longest match between Thomas Kirsch (Germany) and Sebastian Trolle took 3 hours. We were very happy to see our youngest participant having a good time. He’s a 12-year-old who already caught the One Pocket virus. That’s what we do it for! To inspire players of all ages to start playing the game of one pocket. He also enrolled for all other One Pocket Series Open tournaments. Way to go!
Results
The top 8 of the first tournament and therefore also the ranking is as follows:
- Ivar Saris
- Alex Lely
- Tim De Ruyter
- Jelle Kijlstra
- Sanne Krom
- Pepijn de Wit
- Gethin Davies
- Nimesha Perera
The surprise of the day was probably Gethin Davies making it to the quarter finals by beating the German Thomas Kirsch in his qualification match. A good performance and he always brings the good vibes! A pleasure to have him in the tournament. Nimesha, winner of the shoot out ranking 2017, has also done a good job by reaching the quarter finals. He, or course, won a shoot out this event as well to stay alive.
The usual suspects were fighting for the title. The result in the quarter finals said enough about the games. Alex Lely won his match 3-0 from Sanne Krom, just like Jelle Kijlstra over Gethin Davies, and Tim De Ruyter over Nimesha. Ivar Saris won his match 3-1 against Pepijn, or should I write ‘me’?
The first semi-final between Alex Lely and Tim De Ruyter resulted in another donut for Alex. Ivar was too strong for Jelle in their semi-final and won 3-1.
The final was more exciting! A grind that took 2 hours. Both players have had some long days, but kept on fighting till the end. Alex went up 1-0 pretty fast. Ivar made 1-1. Alex then made it to the hill first, but Ivar managed to win both games after that and thereby won the 1st OPS Open 2018 with a 3-2 victory over Alex. It’s his second title in the One Pocket Series.
You can find all results following the links below:
Entries
I was excited by the fact that so many were interested in the One Pocket Series. A waiting list of 14 is great, but also means some players couldn’t participate. So, I decided to open the entry for all other One Pocket Series tournaments much sooner than I had planned and am happy to announce we already have 21 paid entries for those as well!
On to the next one May 13th in pool hall ‘de Distel’ in Roosendaal!