MANILA, Philippines, September 10 ------ The elusive WPA Women’s World 9-Ball Championship crown finally belongs to Rubilen Amit. Amit made history as the first Filipina to rule the event after a superb 3-1 win over former champion Chen Siming of China in the finale at the Claudelands Events Centre in Hamilton, New Zealand.
Capitalizing on the mistakes of her Chinese rival, Amit added another world title to her collection that includes two WPA Women’s World 10-Ball Championship plums won in 2009 and 2013 as she bagged the top purse of $50,000. Chen, initially flashing the form that made her the 2007 champion and a finalist in 2011 and 2014, overcame a 1-2 deficit in the fourth set by winning the next two games for a 3-2 lead and looked on her way to forcing a deciding fifth set. But the Chinese missed a routine corner shot for the eight ball, allowing Amit to pull level at 3-3 in the race-to-four games, best-of-five sets format.
That proved to be the turning point for Amit, whose masterful safety on the one ball to start the seventh game forced Chen to foul. With the ball in hand, Amit easily sank the one ball and methodically cleaned the rest of the rack as she broke through after always falling short of the title in past years. Amit held back tears when she pocketed the nine ball, perhaps relieved and ecstatic to get the job done after a runner-up finish in 2007 and a pair of semifinal appearances in 2018 and 2019.
To reach the finale, Amit needed to beat compatriot Chezka Centeno in the last 16, Chinese Taipei’s Wei Tzu-Chien in the quarterfinals, and Russia’s Kristina Tkach in the semifinals. Chen, who made the title match following a resounding 3-0 sweep of Japan’s Chihiro Kawahara in the semifinals, settled for second for the third time and earned $30,000.
Source: rappler.com
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