Coronation for Oranje, Wales 4th, on day of stunning drama

The incredibly strong Dutch team won the World Team Championships with a dominating performance over Belgium in a crushing 4-1 display in which most of the matches were quite one-sided.  Belgium had done brilliantly to get there and were loaded with strength themselves, but came up against an immovable force.  When seeing this, one feels that the Dutch football federation, who have been trying to win the World Cup for about 70 years, could take a good look at what has occurred.

The Belgians were possibly a tad fatigued and ‘all played out’.  These big tournaments are an endurance course.  This Belgian 8 cube at 9-8 (15), was a bit fresh to say the least:

Joy was unconfined and it was good to see my old pal Misja Alma [with whom I had two feisty romps in Gibraltar in the undefeated and main finals] getting his moment in the sun.  After defeating Mochy in the semi-final, I asked him to compare what it was like to play us both.  “Oh you were tougher!” he opined.  Sensible chap.

Iran-USA Women’s final

The big story of the day though was the sensational Women’s final – one of the most brutal backgammon matches you’ll ever see and a true David and Goliath encounter.  And in a classic example of backgammon bringing the world together, we got to savour America vs Iran.

It all came down to a final match showdown between Melissa Shin – who so cruelly felled Cess Rogers the night before – vs Catherine Thome, a wee protégé of mine who continues her quiet ascent in the sport.  Was she ready for this?  Hmmm, debatable.  And yet after 2 hours of slug and fest – and a grim 1-8 deficit – she nursed an amazing 14-10 Crawford lead.

As with all developing players, Catherine is bashful with the cube and blitzing.  I urged her to put more bullets in the gun for this and she did indeed cube more freely, which made life uncomfortable for Shin.  But could her checkers apply that coup de grace?  At 8-7 Catherine found this lovely 44 that points on the ace, but Catherine played 13/5 (2) instead.  It only costs her 2% wins, but the gammons collapse from 20% to negligible:

At 14-10, in a strong position, but with anxiety rising  CT was faced with this teaser of a 42:

It’s a classic ‘pay me now or pay me later’ play.  This is the match, right here, right now.  But those six return shots spooked Catherine, she neglected to hit and her wins tumbled from 63 to 51%, losing the even race.

In the next, an extremely complicated game saw Catherine scamper off the anchor in the Great Escape.  She was sent back and nailed the mother of all jokers here:

Small problem… she’s down to 1 second on the clock [plus 12 second delay] and although she found the enter, hit, cover and down, two hands appeared on the board, and a fraction before she put the checker on the bar, she stopped her clock.  Shin launched a myriad of appeals, saying CT had saved time by stopping her clock with the other hand, plus she got the order of clock and checker on bar wrong.

After nearly half an hour of ruling committees in smoky oak-panelled rooms, it was deemed that copulating checkers like these are a strict no-no, and they should “get a room”:

Catherine’s play stood, which is the only possible outcome, and regarding the seriously desperate attempt to time Catherine out, Arda ruled that her other hand saved her a second, and there was still 7 left on her delay.  Appeal denied.

Right!  Back to the game, Catherine fired off 66 to be all but home, and return boxes were all that could save Melissa now.  There they are – timely:

Still the race was dominated by Iran, Melissa needed another set, and very, very fast.  She’s spotted the 6 here, and the other dice is spun for ages… there looks to be some paint on there…

You guessed it, 66 for the game after CT’s 21; and the decider was brief and very bloody – USA had pulled it out the fire again.  Donald Trump tweeted his congrats to the US team.

What a match!  And congrats to both nations for a wonderful final, that drew thousands of viewers all over the world.

Welsh wizzes place 4^th

Wales enjoyed yet another thrilling QF win, this time 3-2 vs Germany including Dod Davies pulling Dirk Schiemann and saying, “hold my beer.”  13-1 to Dod was class in a glass.

The semi-final was absorbing, but I really didn’t like the skipper Ian Gwynne dropping himself.  I get it, rotation policy, but Ian is such a beast.  He was too kind there – but what a gesture.

The match saw a monumental comeback by Kev Jones, to get back to 9-12 post-Crawford AND capture two checkers on the 5 point board.  Very luckily Belgium found the ace twice and Kev then must trap him by giving him sixes, and leaving the bar slotted.  But he went into his shell at just the wrong moment and doubled down by making a world record equalling 7 prime which Kev admits was “overkill”.  The trap play is scary, and when you lose to 66 it feels awful, but it is obligatory – the double match point game is no fun, which Kev sadly lost.

A wonderful run by Wales, and as noted yesterday, it should all be studied by historians about how to excel in team competition.  And who knows, maybe now we’ll be seeing more of the ferocious little devils.