Amit yields to Chinese, needs KO win for Last 16

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippines’ Rubilen Amit bungled her chance to clinch the top spot in Group 7 after suffering a 2-6 setback to Chinese-Taipei’s Ho Yun Tan in the Yalin World Women’s 10-Ball Championship at Resorts World Manila yesterday.

It was Amit’s lone setback in five outings in the group play, but it was costly as it denied her the No. 1 seeding and spoiled her bid to clinch an outright berth to the Round of 16 stage. Ho finished with the same record as Amit but she took the top position by virtue of the winner-over-the-other rule and went straight to the Round-of-16.

As it is, the Cebuana ace will have to go through the first knockout phase today to vie for a place in the Last-16.

Amit could only blame an erratic shot in the third rack for the heartbreaking setback. She was in charge early on and seized a 2-0 lead but a botched long shot on the nine-ball gave Ho the opening she needed. The Taiwanese player, a semifinalist in this year’s World 9-ball tilt, quickly jumped on the opportunity to sweep the next six racks and steal the win from the Pinay ace.

Amit was even more disappointed to learn later that she could have actually still wrested the top spot had she won three racks against Ho, which would have given her the edge in the first tiebreak rule of racks won.

The 2009 champion Amit was the lone Filipino left in the tourney after compatriots Iris Ranola, Cheska Centeno, and Gillian Go failed to get past the group stages.

Ranola crashed out Saturday night with a 3-6 loss to Amit in Group 6. Teenager Centeno yielded to veteran Austrian Jasmin Ouschan, 1-6, for a 1-3 card in Group 5 while 16-year-old Go absorbed a 3-6 loss to Belgian Kamila Khodjaeva for 0-4 in Group 6.

Meanwhile, American Kim White-Newsome pulled off the biggest upset of the competition with a 6-5 decision over reigning champion Ga Young Kim of Korea in Group 1.

Unbeaten in her first three matches, Kim appeared headed for easy win No. 4 when she jumped to an early 4-2 lead. However, she made aggressive decisions on offense that did not pay off and Newsome was quick to capitalize. After winning a safety battle exchange, Newsome won the deciding rack to improve to 2-2.

Newsome’s fellow Texan Vivian Villarreal also made waves as she nipped European champion Olivia Czuprynska of Poland, 6-3, then downed Taiwan’s Zhi Ting Wu via the same scoreline in Group 8. Villarreal (2-1) only needed one more win to lock up her spot in the next stage of the Worlds.