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BGonline.org Forums
DENMARK VS THE WORLD
Posted By: Iancho Hristov
Date: Thursday, 4 March 2010, at 7:41 a.m.
Here is a short presentation of the world team for the upcoming challenge of Denmark vs the World at the Nordic Open held in Copenhagen:
Falafel Natanzon- There is no doubt every serious backgammon player has heard of Falafel. He has the typical Hollywood story-no money, left home, lived at the park playing chess, eating falafels, one day he started playing bg and he said to himself - "One day i will be the best player" and he really did it. In 2007 the Giants's list poll Falafel was voted number 1 just ahead of Nack Ballard, breaking his 6 year stay on the top and becoming just the second non American to get first on the Giants List. Falafel cashed in about 65% of the tournaments he played over the last 3 years and he rarely misses any events. He plays in Europe, the US, and even Asia.
For The World Team he will play in 2 sessions-5pt speedgammon and in the doubles. His Chances - from 3 matches he must play in the speedgammon it's very hard to say how many points he will get because Gus is probably the most talented player ever born and the fact that he is not number 1 in the world is that he is into poker for the last 6-7 years. Still, I think Falafel will be around 51-52% fav to win 2 out of the 3 matches.
In the doubles Falafel will play with Peter Heitmueller against Marc Olsen/Thomas Kristensen. At first glance everybody will say that the World is the fav here but hold up just one second. Olsen I believe and hear is super strong with a very low error rate. It is no coincedence Holm picked him for the team from so many wc players in DK. He is also a professional soccer player. About 5 years ago for 3 or 4 months Kristensen was number 1 in GG ranking.
Peter Heitmueller -for those of u who don't know him hede used to be part of the great German generation-Shiemann, Levermann ,Michael Meyburg. He was once in the Giants List then he also turned to poker. He has won the SJ in MC before a few years ago and cashed in lot of events a few years back. 5 years ago he was playing 3.8 on avg. I don't know how his game has changed after that but in that time nobody was playing bellow 3.5 I guess. He will play in the consulting doubles session.
Stick Rice -Yes u are right, this sound a little bit like a donkey name but in my opinion right now Stick is the best American and probably the best player in the world (close between him and Sander) Last 30 matches I got from him he played a PR of 2.2!!! Nobody is even close, the ex record was 2.8 by Francois Tardieu and Sander Lylloff. He started playing bg while studying in France, in just 3 years he has become one of the top players in the world. Right now he is writing articles for GV and running this donkey's forum as he would say. His "passion" are the openings moves, so if u play 21 split instead of slot he would not miss to point out that u are a donkey. For the match against DK he is captain and will play for now only DMP. This is too bad he will play only DMP, cause he can be very useful both for the speedgammon and the 11 pts with his knowledge of the different scores and MET. I guess anyway he will be the best at the DMP sessions, cause he did do a lot of training.
Mochy- He has a very interesting story too. At the beginning of his bg life he won the Las Vegas Open, as he said at that time he was playing more than 10 on avg, so he said he will improve and he did. Nowdays he is the World Champion and one of the best players in the world. In his profile at IBGD he said that he wants to have the lowest error rate on the planet, now he is pretty close, I guess he is in top 10 or even top 3 in the world. He will play the DMPs and doubles with Matt Donkey Geier against 2 wc champs, Trabolt and Andresen. He looks pretty solid in both sessions.
Michy- another great player that i believe deserves more publicity. He has an ultra sharp game and some nice cashes as recent as the second place in Enghien Les Bains. He has 3.14 PR, that is pretty impressive. He will play speedgammon vs Morten Holm where I believe Michy is small fav and heads-up(11 pt) against Sander where probably Sander is small fav.
Matt Cohn-Geier - Remember this name cause I think he is the future of the Backgammon. Already he has cashed in some events and after only 3 years he is playing an avg of 3 and that is not all-he is only 25! I believe he deserves very high place in the top 10 of Giants even though I doubt he will make it this year as Stick did not 2 years ago. He will play DMPs and doubles with Mochy. In the dmps he faces Kristensen which I believe will be an interesting match with Donkey kind of fav. In the doubles I believe with Mochy they are strong fav against the 2 world champs.
Fernando Braconi - He is the European champion of 2008. He is the EU equivalent of the modern style, young bg players with low error ratings. He has impressive online stats and will play speed v. Sander and singles v. Gus, looks scary doesn't it? Never fear, he is damn good and from 8 matches I have recorded of him, his worst was a 1.8!
Katja Spillum -Katja is the best female player in the world and she can easily compete against some of the top players in the game. She is Judit Polgar of backgammon. She will play three 7pt matches against Pia who is also very solid, but I believe Katja is fav.
Coming soon the Dk team...
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