Professional Billiards Association

Professional Billiards Association
Founding logo from 2019
sport	Three-cushion
Founded	February 21, 2019
Place of foundation	Seoul South Korea
Official languages)	Korean, English
Homepage	http://www.pbatour.org/ko/index

The Professional Billiards Association (PBA) is a commercial Korean billiards association . It operates on a national level and is not affiliated with either the Korean Billiards Association (KBA) or the Union Mondiale de Billard (UMB).

history

A first public presentation for the formation of a new association with an affiliated league took place on September 6, 2017. A year and a half passed before it was drafted and finally founded on February 21, 2019. Before the actual tour start in July 2019, the “PBA Super Match” was given a taste for the future audience on April 13, 2019. On April 17, 2019, the first qualification tournaments, the "PBA Open Challenge" and the "PBA Tryout", started to play for the first places in the rankings. On May 7, 2019, Kim Young-soo was solemnly inaugurated as President. The PBA had the old carom master Raymond Ceulemans flown in as an "opening ambassador" for the opening of the first PBA tour 2019/20. On July 5th, the PBA tour officially began with the first games. South Korea is one of the countries with the highest density of players and billiard halls in the world, while Seoul has halls with 60 tables and a waiting list that lasts for months. It is considered to be "enthusiastic about billiards"; there are around 10 million active players, 1.2 million of whom play daily in around 2,000 billiard halls in the country. So it was only logical that the tournaments organized by UMB and broadcast by the connected TV station Kozoom were not enough and economically oriented companies would recognize the gap and work out their own plans to meet the demand. The main owners are the sports agency “Bravo & New” and “Kimchi Billiards”.

aims

In addition to hosting high-value tournaments, a separate league is to be founded. For this purpose, the best of the "Top 20" should be won first, later other players from the "Top 50", the PBA wants a total of 128 players under contract. Since Kimchi is also a sponsor of many players such as Frédéric Caudron , Eddy Leppens, etc., great chances were expected to win them for the PBA. "Billiards TV", a separate TV channel, was set up to broadcast tournaments and league games. The PBA planned such a high tournament density for a cost-covering work that it would never be in line with the UMB event calendar and so the planning was made without the UMB. This inevitably led to tension between the two parties.

As a lure for new players to be won, high prize money was combined with a high tournament density. Since all tournaments will take place in Korea, there will be no flight and accommodation costs for non-Korean players, provided they move their center of life there. For the first season there were just two players, namely Caudron and Leppens, from the "Top 20" who signed.

• First season prize money:
  • for the first three tournaments: US $ 180,000
  • for the penultimate tournament: US $ 270,000
  • For the final tournament: US $ 360,000
• The following number of tournaments are planned for the first five years until 2024:
  • Season 2019/20: 6–8 tournaments
  • 2020/21 season: 8–12 tournaments
  • Season 2021/22: 12-18 tournaments
  • 2022/23 season: 18–24 tournaments
  • 2023/24 season: 24–30 tournaments

Conflict between UMB and PBA

After the first statements by the PBA initiators in 2017, the UMB sought a conversation to agree on the further procedure and the modalities. For its part, the PBA was unwilling to enter into the modalities of joining, hosting tournaments and television broadcasts. Again, the UMB was not prepared to “loan” or release its players to a non-member association. A similar conflict took place in the 1980s / 1990s with the Billiards Worldcup Association (BWA), the initiator of the three-cushion World Cup . The unrest between the two associations dragged on for weeks without result. Following the award ceremony at the World Cup in Antalya, Turkey, the President of UMB Farouk el-Barki said as follows:

“We will not hesitate to ban players from participating in these unapproved tournaments for extended periods of time. We do not accept, and I stress that we will never, that players play in tournaments that are not approved by the UMB. You need to know that we will be imposing huge penalties and not only banning players but preventing them from returning for years. While two private companies are trying to destroy our sport and what we have built over the last three years, the UMB continues to work tirelessly to develop the three-band sport. "

- Farouk el-Barki : Markus Schönhoff, Kozoom

The CEB President Diane Wild drew level with the words:

“It is clear that the CEB will fully support the UMB. A UMB sanction is automatically applied at the CEB and national level. Just like the opposite would be the case, a player who is banned from his association is automatically banned by the CEB and the UMB. "

- Diane Wild : Markus Schönhoff, Kozoom

The founder and CEO of the Kozoom Group, with a branch in Seoul, Xavier Carrer , commented on the PBA's approach as follows:

“Bravo & New, together with Kimchi, are trying to destroy what UMB and Kozoom have built up over the past three years. Bravo & New has a very aggressive strategy to take over the billiards market. They do not rely on the UMB and developing their business outside of Korea. Their business model is based not only on the media market, but also in the equipment business. The main thing is the sale of cues and pool tables. "

- Xavier Carrer : Markus Schönhoff, Kozoom

The two parties used several UMB tournaments to conduct further negotiations, all of which were inconclusive. In May, the UMB announced a threat of ban, which it implemented on July 15, 2019, the start of the 2019/20 season, and issued a one-year ban for the following top players (list not complete):

• No. 002 Frédéric Caudron
• No. 020 Eddy Leppens
• No. 021 Javier Palazón
• No. 027 Filipos Kasidokostas
• No. 028 Birol Uymaz
• No. 030 Kang Dong-koong
• No. 032 Tonny Carlsen
• No. 038 Dương Anh Vũ
• No. 039 Robinson Morales
• No. 042 David Martinez
• No. 045 Oh Sung-uk
• No. 047 Seo Hyun-min
• No. 048 Pedro Piedrabuena
• No. 053 Juan David Zapata Garcia
• No. 062 Kostas Papakonstantinou
• No. 077 Adnan Yüksel
• No. 081 Glenn Hofman
• No. 115 Jean Paul de Bruijn

The specified world rankings are as of July 15, 2019.

The UMB imposes a one-year ban on every PBA tournament participation, but no longer than three years.

Web links

• About PBA - Self-presentation of the PBA
• Raymond Ceulemans appointed PBA Launching Ambassador
• new conversations UMB / PBA
• UMB is serious - locks are through! with complete blacklist

Individual evidence

1. ^ PBA - History. PBA, March 2019, archived from the original on September 11, 2019 ; accessed on September 11, 2019 (English).  
2. ^ Sal Bello: Billiard World In Turmoil - Rival to UMB Forming in Korea. 3-Cushion Billiards, March 4, 2019, archived from the original on March 26, 2019 ; accessed on September 11, 2019 (English).  
3. ↑ About PBA. Introduction to PBA - Lead of Billiards in the World. PBA, March 2019, archived from the original on September 11, 2019 ; accessed on September 11, 2019 (English).  
4. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g} Markus Schönhoff: Korea creates a new conflict in billiards. Kozoom , February 22, 2019, archived from the original on February 25, 2019 ; accessed on September 11, 2019 .  
5. ↑ ^{a b} Markus Schönhoff: UMB is serious - locks are through! Kozoom, July 15, 2019, archived from the original on September 1, 2019 ; accessed on September 11, 2019 .