Vietnam cueist retains world's seventh spot after successful year

Chien confirmed his number one status in Vietnam when Union Mondiale de Billiard (UMB) listed him seventh on the world's elite top 10 list.

The ranking includes final results of the 2019 Three-Cushion World Cup Sharm El Sheikh, the last UMB tournament this year, with the 35-year-old from Ca Mau Province the only Vietnamese representative to make the quarterfinals.

On 194 points, Chien finished seventh in the last eight, losing to Frenchman Jérémy Bury with the score 34-40 last Friday night (local time).

Chien progressed to the quarterfinals of the Survival 3C Masters tournament in South Korea and won the 10th Asian Carom Billiards Championship 2019 in Saigon earlier this year to peak at number three in the world in mid-2019.

After three tournaments, he accumulated a total score of 260 to be ranked seventh, the same position he entered last year.

Chien is the only Vietnamese cueist to have finished in top 10 list this year after Nguyen Quoc Nguyen, who placed ninth in the UMB ranking last year, dropped to 24th.

Do Nguyen Trung Hau climbed from 48th to 27th, Ma Xuan Cuong from 69th to 62th in the latest world ranking, while Ngo Dinh Nai fell from 16th to 29th spot.

Dutchman Dick Jaspers remains the world's number one cueist on 438 points, followed by Italy's Marco Zanetti with 336 points and Sweden's Torbjorn Blomdahl at 305.

Chien, Nguyen and Nai will compete in the 3-Cushion Continental Cup scheduled for Seoul, South Korea, from December 20-22. The tournament has a prize pool of $160,000.