Tony Drago won the eighth edition of the Predator International 10-Ball Championship held at the Riviera Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas over six days with the final played last weekend.

Ninety-six of the world's best players, including six women, from 25 countries, competed for the title with over $66,000 in prizes.

The strong array of players dwindled down to the Last 16 where the representations were five Americans, five Europeans, four Asians, a Canadian and one player from Mexico.

Eventually these were shaved down to the Final Four projecting Jeremy Jones (US), Francisco Bustamante (Philippines), Tony Drago and Marcus Chamat (Sweden).

In the semis, Drago beat Chamet to book a place in the final against Bustamante, a Filipino considered the world's most attractive player in the game. Although the nerves were showing on both players, Drago kept the upper hand throughout to hold the edge and win 13-10.

"The money is great but truly this trophy is really the world for me," Drago said.

"Beating a player like Bustamante to win the final is most meaningful to me. I'm happy to be playing in an event like this. I'm really glad and I believe that I'll be playing a lot of such events in the future," remarked Drago after the presentation.

One of the most thrilling encounters of the championship was that between Drago and Canadian Luc Salvas - the Tornado vs the Machine Gun.

This match lasted only 44 minutes, playing 18 matches, with each match averaging 2 minutes 40 seconds. The greatness of this encounter is appreciated when comparing to other matches, on average most of them took 1.5 to 2 hours to play, averaging 6-7 minutes per frame.