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Welcome back to
the WSOB road show, and the quest for one man or woman to be
crowned World Series of Backgammon champion 2008. You’ve gotta be
in it to win it, and after the stunning success of the UK Masters
last November where 125 hopefuls had a shake at it, we are now
situated in icy, windswept Helsingor, where we have a magnificent
draw of 152. This is an amazing, pioneering wave the world’s
backgammon community is currently surfing, and it’s a privilege to
be along for the ride.
Due to the huge number of entrants, 48 unlucky souls had to dodge
the awful sniper’s bullet that is the round of 256. I dodged it
for about 17 seconds, before my name projectile vomited itself out
of the hat, immediately followed by one of the most famous players
in the world, Matvey “Falafel” Natanzon. More on our match later.
The tension in the room was electrifying as people cowered in
corners and hopped from foot to foot to avoid the ‘256 bullet’,
and after match number 24 was read out a huge roar went out around
the Marienlyst Hotel, as people savoured saving 800 euros worth of
equity. Big names who failed to secure the bye were Japan’s
leading ambassador for the game Mochy Mochizuki, and his British
equivalent John Clark. Mochy fought like a tiger for some three
and a half hours before bowing out 14-17 to Thomas Hansen, and
Clark battled for 12 minutes shy of four hours before succumbing
13-17 to Johnny Pedersen. Thank goodness for the clocks, huh?!
A match-up in the round of 128 that particularly caught my eye was
American veteran Ed O’Laughlin against the strongest lady in the
field, and Last Chance winner in London, Maya Peicheva of
Bulgaria. The match was simply sensational. O’Laughlin scampered
his way to a formidable 12-0 lead, and recubed to 4 in the next at
about 97%. Peicheva snatched, whipped it back to 8, and duly found
her 3% win. Another 4 cube in the next, O’Laughlin over 90% to win
that one too, but a racing 66 off the roof for Maya, and it was
12-12. And then EO’L goes 12-13 down! Backgammon at its most
impish. EO’L fought grimly back to 13-13 and went nicely ahead in
the next. Peicheva took his cube, and then pinged a spectacular
4-cube off the roof when she only had 13 numbers to hit. She
missed but hit one later and, get this, CLOSED O’Laughlin out, had
one last checker on EO’L’s 5-point and his only barricade was that
he had his 6 point, 8 point and 10 points. In other words Maya had
some half a dozen rolls to find one ‘even’ number to sew up the
match. But she KEPT rolling 5-1, had to open up her own 6 point.
EO’L entered, managed to contain Maya’s hapless checker, and
closed her out for match. That’s Backgammon!
I had an exciting match with Falafel and at 5-8 down had chance
after chance to win on a 4-cube for 9-8; but I danced endlessly
and lost another volatile game at 4 to go 5-16. But then post-crawford
I had a near certain gammon and a lot of triples, as Matvey had
three men pinned to my ace-point, while I just had four left on my
deuce and three on my 3 point to bear-off. 12-16 would have been
exciting! Instead (of course), I left the shot, got hit, and lost
the race. GRRRRR! Still, it was a pleasure to play this luminary
of the game; and such flagellation has only left me hungry for
more.
Elsewhere, another US Giant of BG Ray Fogerland also got stuck in
the round of 256, which he won, but then found himself 4-10 down
in his second of the night. But then Ray reeled off a stunning 14
points on the spin to take his place in tomorrow’s draw. He is
joined by Morton Holm in his favourite flower-power shirt and
Burberry hat, prevailing 17-14. UK Masters semi-finalist Allan
Westerman wasn’t so lucky. 99.5% to win the race at 16-16, his
opponent threw 66 66 to nick it. A quick round round-up of the
other big winners and losers: Mads Anderson, Rida Hassan, Claus
Cato are all still in. Piergiorgio D’Ancona, Henrik Veje, Atle Von
der Fehr, Carter Mattig, and Riviera Cup champ Sander Lyllof have
all bitten the dust.
And the last word, as your correspondent signs off at 2am is that
Falafel is in an almighty slugfest with Giotz Hildsberg - they are
locked at 10-10; and 2006 world champion Philip Vischager is
slowly but surely grinding down the plucky Inge Christoffersen
13-10. All matches to 17. It has been a dismal day for Britain,
with last remaining hopes pinned on Nicky Check. Till tomorrow
then, when we’ll know the identity of the last 16, and what a line
up that’ll be.
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