HUSBAND VS WIFE | Joshua Filler vs Pia Filler | Winners' Qualification | 2022 European Open

up until losers qualification it is a race to eight but on the winner's side it is a race to nine well that's not the the normal handshake is it but who will be kissed by success yeah both these players of course playing playing well know each other's game better than anyone but they no matter who wins or loses they'll both be in the event trying to advance to the final 64 one will advance after this match the other has to win when one on the one side i'm trying to think of sporting parallels here where would you see a husband and a wife competing against each other on a major international stage now i know back in england you have very top class female jockeys who would be in the same race and often beating the male jockeys and maybe there's some kind of relationship going on there in the snooker norway in the world cup a few years ago they were represented by a husband and wife but actually man and wife going up against each other in a tournament of this nature of this prestige is it unique yeah i think your first you know analogy of the horse racing i think is probably is about as close as we could get actually have a little experience with that my older brother still owns and trains them and him and my mom started with that in the 80s they actually had the most common jockey was a female and she was she did very well what a shot to open the match from josh filler now it's one thing to pick out a shot but to know you're going to hit the ball so well i really feel special you couldn't figure out what was a better shot this combination right here on the seven or that opening two ball matt lynch of matrimony's press release yesterday announcing that these two would play described joshua and pia as the posh and becks of pool and i think that's absolutely on the money not quite so well known or indeed rich but nevertheless i think the analogy does work well a little light with the cue all there this could get funny it just does creep past the nine and should play with a fairly light speed the one thing you can guarantee here there will be no slight pull from joshua for the he fully respects his wife's capabilities he knows that he will have to play well and he also knows that the most respect he can pay her is to play properly yeah absolutely and i don't think that had to be you know he had to be reminded of that from from his wife yeah you know that got future things going on in this tournament and no reason to start making mistakes at this point no matter who your opponent is just as we've talked about when you're a heavy favorite let alone at being your wife well the break looks pretty efficient there just a matter of whether he can get through for the two ball yeah and i don't know if you notice right there him checking to see if he could get through to the two if the two pass the five and that tells you he's in game mode immediately and pretty impressive i'll tell you a funny little shot here to try and get short side position and i'll tell you what josh is feeling pretty good that's usually what champions do and you might say they get away with a match like you did maybe yesterday and that hill hill match against a former friend and i'm sure still friend but former colleague in the german pool world and they tend to play better and better after getting through a match like that and of course it's worth reminding everyone here that whoever tops the nine ball ranking at the end of this tournament will be guaranteed to be in the mosconi cup team from a european standpoint of course that means that it's either philip or francisco sanchez ruiz and now both of them fsr and josh have both had a major scare and survived it yeah another reminder and storyline of that last big comeback win from fsr looks like p is just going one rail at this a lot of players may kick three rails behind this ball one rail is okay should be pretty firm and a nice hit in snooker we've had a couple of instances where father and son have played each other on the professional tour most recently oliver and peter lines back in the day a really good friend of mine former world number three neil folds had to play his father jeff and of course in pool you get the oscar domenguez jr and senior don't you and i believe when that's the case the father just steps aside well i don't know about that ernesto is definitely a competitor and that's where oscar got his competitive nature from and lou butera with sal butera another of course hall of famer lou butera and his son and another great player from california like you had mentioned years ago there were two brothers i think you said that were the top two players in snooker well yes that's the the extraordinary joe and fred davis brothers can't remember their names and i shouldn't i think there were two brothers some 20 years ago maybe that dominated doubles in tennis for for some time but normally when family are involved in sports they're usually on the same side but not in this match yes joe and fred davis when the world championship began in 1927 joe won it and he remained undefeated in the world championship until his retirement from that tournament in 1946 and then fred basically took over as the dominant force and he won the world title eight times wow the problem was with joe and fred joe obviously wanted to retain that unbeaten title in the world championship who wouldn't and in the 46 championship which was very well attended and it really put snooker even higher on the sporting consciousness fred came very close to beating joe i don't think joe was too pleased about that kind of result so what did he do he retired from the world championship but continued to play in other tournaments to keep that undefeated tag in his case the o didn't go right so a couple of missed pots here from josh pia has got the chance to equalize man i almost see a little bit you know pia's pace around the table usually a bit slower than josh's and i wonder maybe playing josh she may be playing a little faster than normal she sure has come a long ways with her pool game in the last couple of years and i'm not sure what her ranking is but i gotta believe it's in the top 10 i would think you know definitely in europe oh undoubtedly she's an 11-time german champion and this year earlier this year she won the european eight ball championship forward i'm showing the power right there taking a very small angle and that's a sign of comfort smile on the face of joshua fuller but i'll tell you what knowing him you'll be thinking that's enough of that it really is a an extraordinary match to commentate on actually yeah and i think we're gonna see some great pool from both players and another you know memory that all of us will take and especially these two at the table i wouldn't even call that a wry smile there that was a that was pretty genuine i think probably happy to see pia get on the board quickly so on the one lost side i can tell you chris milling his latest match he's two on up on daniel bacchus the oglu from sweden scholar woodward and matt edwards they've shared the first four racks two each there and hector iglesias and yanni siki they're hill hill 77 making a ball on the break one not really agreeing a little covered up by the three little tactical battle and be a pretty sharp player overall like most probably wants to get the best of josh on the tactical side of things because it's awfully hard to get the best of josh any other manner yes and of course after the defeat and exit of Veronica Ivanovskaia last night pia filler is the last woman left in the tournament and she's got a she's got a loss left if she does happen to lose this she'll go to the one having to win one more match to make that final 64 and what a feat that would be i know she wants to go further of course but he wants to stun the cue ball a little bit behind the three it looks like oh didn't realize she didn't have all the one ball to shoot up pretty nice shot though overall yeah just to further expand on what you're saying there jeremy yes the the loser does have one more life the loser of this match will play either melling or vacas the oglu and again this is really where as a spectator of course there's been some great matches there's been some great upsets we always pull for the underdogs it seems but this is really where you start to find all the quality matches of the event is he going for the nine and i think josh would have shot at that playing anyone really it looked like a little bit of a loose play but the safety was awfully tough and if you're ever going to shoot at a bank combination or combination bank excuse me this one was laying pretty nice didn't miss by much so of course ronald regley and alexa pasel's playing on the youtube channel matrim's youtube channel ronald regley trying to get on the board trailing three to zero i think josh can get at this and he does have an angle to come across maybe into the two six maybe behind the two for natural short side position oh maybe now that tells me maybe he's partially snookered at the one get at it possibly make it though so the two and the six where they sit very close to each other didn't place a great amount of jeopardy on that shot by the way ronald regley did win that fourth rack over on table two so has been reduced to three one and you can see that many of the fans have come over into the seating part of the arena to watch this match yeah when torston holland got through half an hour or so ago there was a big crowd on that side of the grandstand watching him and a big cheer went up when he just about got over the line yeah he'll he'll match and it's good for thorson to get through that his first match he's still got to win a couple more i believe to qualify good to get started and get through a tough one he caught a double kiss there just something i liked her shot selection i just don't think you could avoid the double kiss the way it laid here with of course josh won the gold medal the world games and he had a nice showing as well played awfully well kelly fisher just seems to be unbeatable on the lady's side in 2022 yeah that world games hosted by birmingham alabama when you think of alabama yorks think of the crimson tide and war eagle and all that kind of stuff well there were plenty of discussions i've always even though i was a big bear bryant fan growing up but i was always a guy unless it was my team i was an underdog kind of guy so i always grew up a little bit more of an auburn fan and i expressed that a few times some didn't take it so nicely over in birmingham but found a few auburn fans over there but definitely heavy on the on the maroon all right now the focus for pierre phillip he's on the blue the blue two ball in hand and this could be promising yeah i don't know if the four goes by the nine in the left side difficult little situation there it looks like it's stuck to the nine may not have the opposite side either so here you want to stay off the rail with the cue ball anytime you're really trying to manipulate to get short side position or break balls out staying off the rail is kind of important now she may be able to play a kiss shot on the nine coming off the pink four and colliding kissing the nine on the side actually she's gotten perfect for that kiss shot if that's what's needed here now she's looking to see i guess the four does pass pierre phillip does not seem phased in any way by the unique circumstance by being center stage by being in front of the cameras equipping herself really well so far a little bit of a mistake there no reason to get this thin on the six with the seven nine so handy over the sides i think if you look at it mentally you got to believe that if anyone's a little you know out of sorts behind playing their their partner you would think it would affect josh a little more than pia in my opinion anyways so oh dear that is a miss that no one could possibly have foreseen no and it looked like just a little miss hit on the cue ball maybe put a hair more left english than she desired and we always talk about this the table will tighten up as the days go on and you know you do not want to hand josh filler an invitation to go on one of these patented streaks of brilliance maybe that invitation was handed out right there filler j leads filler p to one just one more match to be completed on the losers round two section david volkovsky finds himself seven six up on jorge welsh when that match is over that will be the second round in the losers in the books you know josh would know off well maybe across that bank does play but i don't think you're going to see josh vary from how he plays too much and i say that for two different reasons or or two reasons you may think he he may vary that being of course his wife he's playing and of course a considerable favorite as well josh of course an aggressive player but i don't think you'll see him go for many loose shots that he wouldn't normally play he's a confident player that's why he's arguably the best in the world at the moment because he kind of takes the game over a little bit more or you know the upper echelon players are going to consider that bank most are going to pull the trigger on it but it just does the same seems to hit the ball just a little better than most big shot here kind of going back and forth oh he went three rails inside english shot you must have in your arsenal you know when he won the world masters in gibraltar earlier this year i interviewed him afterwards for billiards digest and i said to him you know what's the what's the plan will you celebrate he went not really he said i'm happy for about half an hour after i've won a tournament and all i do is start thinking about the next one and that is so alike the snooker player steven hendry he always used to say i'll get more pleasure in avoiding feeling bad about defeat than i do about actually being over the moon about winning and i think filler is exactly in that category as well he's got an insatiable appetite for success and no matter how many tournaments he wins and he's still a very young man he will want to win more and more and more he'll be never satisfied yeah and winning comes along with just playing better as well that's where he wants to he knows if he plays his game he's going to be near the end of the event quite often you know usually this is the part we can't always see what's going on but usually when someone's so gifted physically there's a lot of gift mentally as well and i think that's what you're getting at there that works 15 start he's made in 2022 he's not placed outside of the well that's saying something not only with how many great players we have today but how fickle our game can be and i think with the new break rule you know i used to say that of course execution will overcome a little bit of a bad decision or knowledge at times even but i think that's going to change a little bit now with our break rule we have so many young players that shoot straight very good with the jump cue but still are lacking some of the experience and knowledge of the top players and i think that's going to show up a bit more but it's also going to make them gain knowledge quicker which i think in the end the players are going to appreciate it low kill shot here and there was just a tad too much kill although the green six ball was never going to be too much of a headache you know a lot of the players would rather take more of that cut than the rest of the cue ball on the rail now josh getting on with josh does putting the rhythm together along with some runs yes when pia filler missed that quite simple seven ball on the verge of leading to one you wondered whether that would be the catalyst for a husband to start to dominate it certainly looks that way now he leads 4-1 over on table two the action you can see on the matrim pool youtube channel alexa was three nil up on ronald regley it's now three two other matches on the winner's qualification side babkin melconian from romania's four three up on senator azar and roman hebler five nil up on abdullah al yusuf i'll give you some more at the end of this rack okay it looks like a rollout situation for josh the ball just running on top of the three i've just seen an inventive cushion first one nine combination from alexa over on table two so he now leads ronald regley 4-2 yeah and a great shot from pazels but a little bit of a so-so safety i thought from ronald maybe didn't think it through quite as much rolling out to some distance it looks like i don't see pia passing this should be able to put the two on the long left side rail let the cue ball go between the five six and over to this right side rail kind of using the six seven as blockers she's got some other options i guess you could kind of bank the two away up table and kind of hold the cue ball with a draw stroke i'm going to give you some good news jeremy scarlett woodward five two up on matt edwards and that moves around three match yeah and i talked to sky after his loss yesterday and he said he just couldn't get settled felt a little jumpy a great shot i'm surprised that pia passed on that rollout now she may have not gone offensive like josh but a lot of players pass on some rollouts these days where a long time ago i was told by many of the greats of our game you rarely pass the rollout really has to be a unique situation and look at that again you know he produced for me the shot of yesterday it was out on a an outside table and it was the two ball had to find a gap between two balls having potted the two off the rail in the deciding rack against rafael val he was under immense pressure he knocked in the two sweetly found the gap landed on a three nine combination and that was that it wasn't just brilliance it was brilliance immaculately timed well just like any sport you have to close the door on the best that's just how it is if you if you don't they're looking to revel in those big moments and it's not the last incredible situational shot we'll see from josh and probably not the last one we'll see this week so just imagine he still has a little ways to go tactically and once once that comes in place yeah the missed seven ball from pia fuller really has opened the flood dates for joshua who's won four consecutive racks now and he's 5-1 ahead he's had two contrasting matches so far in this tournament he beat gj oran goran 9-0 in 32 minutes now bear in mind that was 32 minutes of being out there so a lot of those minutes were taken up with the the re-racking of the balls absolutely but then second match against rafael vile which i just told you about when he made that brilliant two ball in the deciding rack that was very different he was 5-0 6-1 and 8-4 down yeah didn't get the connection there we'll see pia back at the table don't know if she has a kiss shot on the two but she does have a cross side bank that may offer some backdoor safeties even if she misses she should definitely play some type of bank here try and get offensive a little bit especially early in the rack and you don't realize with all the congestion playing safe on the one ball of course you have to do it because we can't determine shots after the break but sometimes you need to really look at the offensive side of things because i like her going for that because players kick out of situations so well and with eight or nine balls on the table they're going to get a lot of safeties behind it looks like josh can get it this one i'll tell you as far as table two and ronald regley and the swiss players in general but very impressed not a country that is talked about that much as one of the dominant countries in europe but i'll tell you they're coming along yeah regley in here to trim his deficit to just a single lockage four three this feeling michael has mentioned tomorrow is the final 64 in the single elimination we'll play two rounds of that to get down to the final 16 for the weekend yeah the way it works from here as jeremy said then on saturday we have the last 16 and the quarterfinals and then on sunday just four remain two semifinals and a final for you looks like he's trying to kick two rails behind the one trying to send the cue ball at the pink four possibly pocketing the seven that's hanging i think that's the way he's trying to kick at this safety as well may have pocketed this one we'll see our first jump i would think from pia may have a real first between the eight and the five with the cue ball something if you are watching the youtube channel you see ronald regley as one of the few players if the only player i've seen breaking head-on with our new break rule no cut break at all yeah meeting the challenge head-on literally you know i did that a few years ago at the u.s open i made a little bit of a run at the tournament the last year that shane won it actually and i would play the cut break about halfway through the match and you know be swapping games just because it's such a tough tough type of break to extend any lead against great players and i'd switch to a head-on and run a few racks behind it and once the matches don't think it's a terrible thing to switch during during the during the matches applause there for pia filler completing that jump shot and knocking in the one but the five is obstructing the two she's done herself no favors really sorry phil not a terribly tough kick to get safe though you want to hit the two full and just kind of roam the cue ball behind the eight nine just let the two go up to the end rail a little hard there though no pocket for the two i don't think it banks cross side so josh probably tries to squeeze the cue ball maybe underneath the pink let the two come out to the middle of the table and i'm really impressed by joshua fuller's approach here it's absolutely perfect he's treating the game he's treating his opponent with the utmost respect and that's really good to see and then i think he's doing himself a lot of favors just sticking to the same thing he would do playing any of these opponents in the tournament we've seen some other players vary i think at times and i don't think you're doing yourself any favors there and this is a tough jump got to carry a few balls that are a little bit apart from each other he's got to go over a piece of the nine and the wow he did pocket it but the cue ball just got a little hot and off the table now he was looking at that a little anxiously not because he didn't think he'd made the combo he didn't want the three in clearly it stayed out and now he's banging one thing you can do if you're watching josh is learn how he just you know even if he has to work the rock a little more that being the cue ball he just almost always goes with the natural path of the cue ball and that's just another reason why he's such a straight shooter when you're going against the grain that's when you start to miss balls six one five racks in succession for one of the the men of 2022 i say one of the men because of course there's a a debate as to who has had the the best year shane van boning is the reigning world nine ball champion after that triumph in Milton Keynes and we must not discount what Fedor Gorsht is doing in the USA winning tournament after tournament and accumulating a large wad of cash yeah we were just talking about that prior to coming over for this match and you know of course he wants to be in these big events and right now just isn't the timing but he's doing what champions do he's grinding it out he's still playing a lot of great players over in the U.S. making some dollars i think there's a lot of Americans over there that should be paying attention to how much effort is put into his career even if he can't be in necessarily the biggest tournaments in the world at the moment you know Josh is going to be slowed down a little bit here so we should get a look at P at the table unless he plays the kick here this one is off the rail a little bit this is a pretty easy kick shot for these players and i don't think again this is a shot that he wouldn't shoot playing one of what you consider the top threats against this lefty now then Pierre Filler has to banish the negative memory of the missed seven ball in rack three and try to forge some kind of recovery nice shot on the one pulling the cue ball in or the two got a little straight here though so she's going to have to work the cue ball a little bit either a draw stroke elevating the cue maybe a little top inside wrapping the cue ball out of the corner so it looks like the draw strokes you may have to cheat the pocket a little bit here also to avoid the purple five a little worried about that and there you can see the double blocker so once more elevation needed well she had a foul on one of her jumps but she's two for two pocketing the ball don't expect any problem getting the cue ball down quickly watch out if she overcuts it maybe a little nine ball action open table for hubby you brought up a name Federer Gorst i always bring talk about him a lot in the coaching aspect of things as far as you know how many how his reps pay off and i think sometimes we forget to talk about Josh it is obvious the reps he puts in the confidence he displays and that comes from so much training it's nice to see it pay off for these for these players that really put in the time and obvious the talent is probably like no other in the game and perhaps most frightening of all for those trying to dislodge him Joshua Feller doesn't turn 25 until October he's still very much building up to the prime of his career yeah and i think some things are going to continue to make him improve of course the direction that the pool scene is going in the great players that are going to push him and of course his desire is probably the biggest factor nine ball cross side you called it Jeremy he's the first player in the tournament to make a golden break in two matches he started off the event with a golden break and now he knocks one in here well not to cause any drama i'd like to see Pia when Josh was smiling and see how much she was maybe smiling in comparison to him yes entirely magnanimous she described Joshua Feller in an interview i did with him yesterday as the love of my life and nothing will change with this result oh when Josh first came around you know a young guy so great some players and i'll be fair that seemed at times it may be a hair arrogant but i think he's matured well and one thing i found out about Josh is i think i did it maybe in an interview or something like that is he's a very sincere guy i think he uh plays with a lot of fire a lot of emotion and just a lot of pureness very genuine that was Pia's reaction it's all team filler so with Josh on the hill can Pia delay this i fancy her chances of getting out here just gonna maybe shave the three a bit try and push it past the side to make things easier for the three in the same corner as the two it's nice alexa forging on against ronald regley on table two it's seven three now and he's breaking off as you can see or certainly here in rack 11 you'll hear that in a moment from the other side of the arena and Pia putting a little thought into this really from the four to the five it's probably the shot that will determine if she gets out here in rack number 10 i wouldn't try to do too much here she did the pocket nicely and that made things a lot easier coming across the table smart shot so probably got a little thinner on this five than she would have wanted but i think she can follow by the seven two rails to the center of the table and i think if she gets out here we'll hear a nice cheer and we should actually from the fans yeah the missed seven ball in the third rack was the start of her losing streak but i can't imagine she's going to miss this seven ball you know a little awkward queuing over the side packs the bridge up get a little more comfortable very right eye dominant player as you can see hang on a minute says pia josh you're not in the last 64 just yet you'll have to wait it's eight other scores around this arena roman hebler six one up against abdullah al yusuf these are all in the winners qualification by the way that's from norway he's two nil up on john mora alex kazakis and tyler style locked together at three three low ho sum six five upon conrad joshua neils fine and jose alberto delgado four four dennis grabber five nil up on the young german moritz newhausen and alvin auschen four three up on mikhail and i'll tell you lojo some i'm just always impressed with that young man really seems like a very pleasant person but also just becoming kind of a killer on the table and just keeps seems to keep getting results quickly some interesting scores on the losers round three slate alosha schnapp six one up on riku rompainen elliott sanderson four two down to johanna schmidt chris melling five three up on daniel bakker sioglu and i can tell you skyler woodward is through he's defeated matt edwards eight two be interesting to see if she goes for this long rail bank here sits pretty nice a lot of the guys are i should say players and the bank sits nice here a lot of times it's hard for them to pass on it she is trailing eight to two safety's not just so easy can't really run it easily off the eight such a big ball in the table to try and run the cue ball off the right side of the one should could just bank it down table i guess but i like her going for this just cut it a little too much a lot of times what happens with that is you're trying to get some cue ball movement just mentioning scarlet woodward through into the losers qualification round where he awaits the loser of the match on the winner's qualification side between jason shaw and jason's got to uh he's got to play well in that match batter always seems to play pretty solid doesn't really vary a whole lot not not a guy usually he's going to run seven or eight racks on you but just going to play super solid terrible let up there on the downswing not something you see from josh too often i think he cuts this all the way down here in a moment side pocket the speed it doesn't agree to me looks like you'll get behind the eight where if you play it in the corner you definitely have choices with your speed control there it is the meeting of the husband and wife it results in joshua fuller defeating pia filler by nine racks to two that was the expected result and i think the turning point undoubtedly was the third rack when pia had the chance to go two one up and missed the seven ball