World number one pound-for-pound king Manny Pacquiao became the first individual to reach the semifinal round of ESPN STAR Sports’ Champion of Champions competition, an online poll that will decide the Sports Personality of the Year who made the biggest impact in the world of sports.

Fans all across Asia voted Pacquiao over Liverpool striker Fernando Torres of Spain in the quarterfinal round yesterday. The Filipino ring sensation earlier beat motorcycle racer Valentino Rossi in the first round. Pacquiao is now set to face off against the winner between Indian cricket player Sachin Tendulkar and Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson.

The initiative, led by ESPN STAR Sports’ website www.espnstar.com in conjunction with Asia’s most popular sports news show SportsCenter, aims to garner public opinion to determine the individual who has gone beyond achievements and new levels of excellence to leave his mark on sports fans in 2008.

The “People’s Choice” will be chosen from a list of 16, which was pre-determined by fans across the region through forums, and the voting mechanism will be in the form of a knockout format. The sports personalities were drawn against each other in pairs through an open draw conducted “live” on ESPN’s SportsCenter as well as live streaming on www.espnstar.com last Nov. 28.

Members of the public will be able to cast their votes immediately after the draw, and the sports personality with the most votes will go through the next round. Following the first stage of elimination, a quarterfinal, semi-final and final round will be conducted where the Champion of Champions will be announced live on SportsCenter this Dec. 31.

Other personalities who made the last 16 include football superstars Cristiano Ronaldo, F1 champion Lewis Hamilton, World Number One tennis player Rafael Nadal, cricket heroes MS Dhoni and Sourav Ganguly, reigning NBA MVP Kobe Bryant, Tiger Woods, Beijing Olympics record-breakers and headliners, Michael Phelps and Usain Bolt.