14-1
My first opponent in the discipline 14-1 came from Belgium. After a medium quality match, I could defeat G. Vermeersch 125-60. My next opponent had had a walk through in round one and came also from Belgium. I played better and won against W. Haesen 125-22. In round three, I had to play V. Földes from Hungary and this match was already decisive to enter the final round of 32 players. I managed to win 125-105 and entered the final round, in spite of having trailed with more than 70 balls. Now, the draw made me play against the Austrian youngster A. Ouschan. The final score of 125-119 tells a lot about this match. It was a real thriller until the end and both players had two or three times the opportunity to win the match. With a bit of luck, I had entered round 4. Here, I played Dutchman H. See and I was not lucky anymore. In principle, I was in control of the match and when already leading 80-40, I proposed a difficult combination to See. He tried to play it, missed it by far and then, he was simply very lucky. 13 open balls and the cue ball travelled press to a ball. I had no chance to play a safety and no open ball – so I tried a rail shot. I missed it and the score evolved to 80-100. During this series, the Dutchman almost lost the cue ball twice, but the edge of the middle pocket and another ball saved him twice. Without being lucky, I lost 89-125 and finished on the 9th rank.

The gold medal went to my team mate T. Hohmann, who had won his semi-final and the final with a single 125 series each. Only the scores of his first and second round matches were somehow tight and his match against D. Jungo (SUI) was the worst and he could also had lost it. A surprise was the great result of the young German N. Ottermann, who only lost in the final. A. Lely (NED) and T. Storm (SWE) won the bronze medals. I have to mention the disqualification of T. Engert, who did not show in the second match of the losers bracket, because the team manager had told him a wrong time and he could not be found in the vast location.

8-Ball
My first opponent in the second discipline was J. Janata from the Czech Republic. I played well, won 8-1 and then had to play my team mate O. Ortmann. I was leading 7-4, but then the player from Hamburg (where he moved to recently) came back to 6-7 and did not pocket any ball upon his break. I won 8-6 and the next German opponent was waiting for me. My room mate T. Engert could come back after trailing by four racks and equalled the score at 7-7. But I managed to win the decisive 15^th rack and entered the final round by winning 8-7. Here, I had to face B. Muratore from Italy. The won the break shot-out and ran out the first table. In the second rack, he tried a jump shot after the break and the cue ball fell. I ran out this rack and then another 7 racks and won 8-1. In round four, I had to wait 45 minutes for my opponent M. Erculj (SLO) to show up. The first racks were rather laborious, since no open tables were left after the break. At 3-1, my opponent committed a foul, but he would not 
recognize it and the referee who was called would not sanction this foul. After a short discussion, I potted the 8 ball which I had missed before, with a rail shot to lead 4-1. My opponent took a Time-out and I wanted to continue to play. But the referee did not succeed to set up the rack press within 9 minutes and finally, I had to rack up myself. Upon the break, no ball fell and the man from Slovenia came back. During the next rack, while I was playing, an upcoming shot-clock of 35 seconds per shot was announced. This totally disturbed me and I missed the last ball before the 8 ball. My opponent won the rack and the shot-clock was activated by the German head referee. Now, I was completely out of the zone and all of a sudden, I was trailing 4-7. The man from Slovenia was not impressed by the shot-clock. In one rack, he managed to move three times more than 8 balls and still could run out the table. This is not a way I can play 8-Ball. Even if I could come back to 5-7, I potted the cue ball upon the break in rack 13 and I was very disappointed to be eliminated in round 4 on the score of 5-8.

9-Ball
Having been runner-up last year, I had a walk-through in round one of the last individual competition. In the winner bracket, I played K. Lannoye from Belgium, the son of the EC 1992 runner-up in 9-Ball, M. Lannoye. I a good match, I finally won 9-5. In my next match against R. Lysholm from Norway, I won 9-6 and was directly qualified for the final round. The draw designated I. Putnik from Croatia as my next opponent. In this match, I had a good run and benefited from some mistakes by my opponent. I won 9-3 and had to play M. Juva from Finland in round 4. I played well and finally came over the hurdle of round 4 to enter the quarter-finals winning 9-6. Here, I had to play once more my room mate T. Engert (GER). I won the very good match 9-3 and so eliminated the defending champion. In the semi-final, it came to the show-down against M. Immonen (FIN). The man from Finland had not played the first two disciplines due to stomach problems and had only arrived a few days later. He was well re-established and turned my 1-3 lead into a 6-3 lead for him. A mistake and a skid (a bad contact between the cue ball and the object ball) brought me back into the match and on the winning lane. By winning 9-7, I entered the final against A. Lely (NED) who had upset T. Hohmann (GER). In the first 3 racks, I had two long entry balls – I missed both of them and was trailing 0-3. Then, I slowly came into the match and started to put the new 8-Ball European Champion under pressure. At 7-4, I played a bad safety and Lely came back to 5-7. I could win the next match and at 8-5, I had the first match point to come. But I clearly missed the position from the 8 ball to the 9 ball and so I decided to play a rail shot for the middle pocket. But I missed the shot and the score evolved to 8-6. In the next rack, Lely was lucky because he contacted the 2 ball with a very thin rail shot and so he prevented the foul. However, I had a good opportunity to play a safety, but the 2 ball did not travel far enough and the Dutchman could win this rack, too. He then ran out the table to equal the score at 8-8. In the last and decisive rack, he potted a ball upon the break and missed the 1 ball. But the 1 ball remained so badly in front of the pocket, that I could not make much of it. I played the 1 ball via the rail press on the 1 ball and Lely did the same twice as well. At the third try, he played a perfect massé shot and I was in a safety position. I could not reach the 1 ball via the rail, so I decided to play a jump shot. I wanted to play the 1 ball via the rail in the direction of the 2 ball and the 9 ball, hoping that one of the two might fall. But unfortunately, the 9 ball remained a centimetre before the pocket and the 2 ball press and straight just behind. The 1 ball travelled in front of the opposed pocket and did not fall either. The cue ball was 20 cm behind the 1 ball and Lely only needed two easy balls to win 9-8 and the title.
This was probably the most bitter defeat in my 31 years billiards career and I will have nightmares about it.

Team competition

After a walk-through, we won the match against Hungary with a tight 2-1.
T. Hohmann – G. Solymosi   8-7
R. Souquet – V. Földes  9-5
N. Ottermann – M. Balázs  87-100 (match stopped)

We then defeated our next opponent Sweden clearly 3-0 and so reached the quarter-finals.
R. Souquet – M. Chamat  8-4
T. Engert – E. Weiselius  8-6 (match stopped)
O. Ortmann – T. Storm  125-51

After my horror defeat in 9 ball, the next day we continued with our quarter-finals match. The draw made us play the team from France and because I did not sleep enough, I did not play this match. My team mates scored a clear 3-0 and we had entered the semi-finals.
T. Engert – V. Facquet  8-6
O. Ortmann – E. Robaine  9-3
T. Hohmann – S. Cohen  91-73 (match stopped)

In the semi-finals, I was in good shape again and so I played. We won 2-1 against the strong team from Finland.
R. Souquet – M. Lohtander  8-2
O. Ortmann – M. Juva  9-5
T. Hohmann – M. Immonen  43-125

In the final, we expected to play the Dutch team, but they could not win against the Czech Republic and had to make do with the Bronze Medal. So, the finals was against the Czech Republic.
R. Souquet – J. Jelinek  8-2
T. Engert – L. Krenek  9-6
O. Ortmann – R. Hybler  87-125  

Like in the semi-final, I finished my match first and scored our 1-0 lead. Then, Hybler equalled the score, playing a 90 series against Ortmann and our fate was now in the hands of T. Engert. 20 years ago, at the first Team EC, the owner of a billiard café in Düren, Germany, had to play the decisive match for the title, at the time against Sweden – and he had won. The circle was closed, since this time as well, he scored the decisive point and we won the Team Competition, which was played in this format for the last time. Since 1985, Germany has won this title 15 times.