■ BATA REYES BEAT CEBUANA AMIT IN AN EXHIBITION GAME
Efren Reyes wins P50,000 after beating Rubilen Amit in friendly match, 7-4, at Casino Español de Cebu
Cebu’s pride Rubilyn Amit and the legendary cue artist Efren “Bata” Reyes treated the Cebuanos to an exhibition game at the Casino Español de Cebu. Inc. last Thursday night. The player-coach tandem of Amit and Reyes played with members of Casino Español in a 9-ball doubles before the winner-take-all 9-ball singles.
Cebu’s pride Rubilyn Amit and the legendary cue artist Efren “Bata” Reyes were in Cebu to treat the Cebuanos to an exhibition game at the Casino Español de Cebu. Inc. last Thursday night.
The player-coach tandem of Amit and Reyes played with members of Casino Español de Cebu in a 9-ball doubles before the winner-take-all 9-ball singles at the Salon de España room.
The ageless Reyes, also known as The Magician, showed what he’s made of, beating Amit 7-4 to walk away with the P50,000 cash purse.
“Of course it’s always an honor to play the greatest of all time. He’s my idol and every time we play, there will always be the ‘kilig’ factor,” said Amit, referring to Reyes, who coaches the national team together with Francisco “Django” Bustamante and Rodolfo Luat.
Amit is preparing for her next big competition, which is the International 9-Ball Championship in Taiwan in March.
“My next event is for the world ranking and it’s really a big deal tournament. Playing against Tatay Efren is helping me and is good for my practice,” the Cebuana said.
Waning populariy
Amit, the two-time champion in the WPA Women’s World TenBall Championships, said that she has learned a lot of pointers from Reyes, especially the technique and game-time decisions.
Reyes, for his part, said that he’s happy to be invited in Cebu and to play against his ward Amit. He said that right now the Visayas and Mindanao have a great pool of cue artists.
“There are a lot of good players now. They can even beat me. But I think the popularity of billiards has lessened because the TV telecasts are fewer now compared to before,”said Reyes in Tagalog.
Casino Español members had an eight-man tournament and the top two players got to play with Reyes and Amit in 9-ball doubles.
Reyes teamed up with Marc Gonzalez, while Amit played alongside Michael Miranda. The pair of Reyes and Gonzalez, who’s also a golfer, ruled the 9-ball doubles match, 7-6.
Amit and Reyes also gave the spectators the chance to play with them. Each player was given one rack to play with the professional cue artists.
The exhibition game was organized by Casino Español de Cebu. Inc. in cooperation with Puyat Sports. /