UK Championship 2018. BBC/Eurosport 27th Nov - 9th Dec

ArmaniJeanss

Still second biggest tourney of the year I reckon, despite the butchering of the format this decade.
£170K to winner. Ronnie defends.

Draw is done.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_UK_Championship#Main_draw

Gamblage.
https://www.oddschecker.com/snooker/uk-championship/winner

AllForIt

Your so right OP on the butchering of this tournament. I used to love the UK as a teenager with it's longer frames format but now I don't feel it has the prestige it once had. For me there is noting better than the longer frames format. Twists and turns that aren't possible in first to 6.

Gaoth Laidir

AllForIt wrote: »

Your so right OP on the butchering of this tournament. I used to love the UK as a teenager with it's longer frames format but now I don't feel it has the prestige it once had. For me there is noting better than the longer frames format. Twists and turns that aren't possible in first to 6.

The shorter format will suit Ronnie. He's running near 100% win rate in that format over the past while.

Frank O. Pinion

Back when it was a 32-man tournament, with best-of-17s, there were still qualifying rounds for the other players on the tour, which were also best-of-17s. There were fewer tournaments back then, which allowed for that. Now, with so many events and trying to make each ranking event fair for all 128 players, something had to give. At least it's less of a lottery than the "Home Nations" events, with best-of-7s until the quarter-finals. For reference, the five winners since the event switched to an open 128-man draw, have been Neil Robertson (2013, 2015), Ronnie O'Sullivan (2014, 2017), and Mark Selby (2016), so it's not like there's been a crazy fluke winner with the newer format.

BBC coverage doesn't actually start until next Saturday, 1st December, after the 1st round finishes, and the round of 64 begins.

Joe_ Public

Worst decision the new regime ever did was to scale down the uk. While there are, mercifully, no best of 7s it still needs more to stand out from the torrent of tournaments that seem to come at us almost weekly nowadays. A plague on the bbc too which actively canvassed for it to suit the schedules.

On the table Ken going well against a decent young Chinese prospect. A couple of wins here would be massive in terms of retaining his tour card for next season.

zuutroy

Ken plays Ronnie next (assuming Ronnie wins) so don't fancy his chances for a second win this week.

Joe_ Public

zuutroy wrote: »

Ken plays Ronnie next (assuming Ronnie wins) so don't fancy his chances for a second win this week.

Yeah forgot that, sayonara it is you’d have to think. Still, a handy 5k which could easily be the difference between 64 and 65 by seasons end!

Joe_ Public

I know Shaun Murphy has been having a dreadful season but I truly can’t believe he’s lost his first round match today. The move to Ireland not paying any dividends yet.

AllForIt

Joe_ Public wrote: »

I know Shaun Murphy has been having a dreadful season but I truly can’t believe he’s lost his first round match today. The move to Ireland not paying any dividends yet.

Ah that's disappointing. One of my favorite players to watch when he's on form.

He seemed to have upped his game and attitude in recent years and he lost some weight but he seems to have fallen back to his old ways.

I didn't know he moved to Ireland. Whereabouts do you know?

Gaoth Laidir

AllForIt wrote: »

Ah that's disappointing. One of my favorite players to watch when he's on form.

He seemed to have upped his game and attitude in recent years and he lost some weight but he seems to have fallen back to his old ways.

I didn't know he moved to Ireland. Whereabouts do you know?

Balinteer. His STAR table is now located alongside Fergal O'Brien's in Celbridge Snooker Club.

Sky Blue 20

Joe Swail won his game 6-5.
Nice to see Joe get a round or two.
Is a real Gentleman.

Joe_ Public

AllForIt wrote: »

Ah that's disappointing. One of my favorite players to watch when he's on form.

He seemed to have upped his game and attitude in recent years and he lost some weight but he seems to have fallen back to his old ways.

I didn't know he moved to Ireland. Whereabouts do you know?

As someone mentioned he’s practicing hard with Fergal OB over in celbridge without getting the results. Hard to know where it’s going wrong, suspect he’s a bit dumbfounded himself. Looks like he’ll be down to around 11 or 12 in the rankings after this and will be under pressure to keep his top 16 place for the crucible if this bad run continues. On second thoughts dropping out of top 16 might not be worst thing ever happen to him. Seemed to do Mark Williams no harm when same happened to him a few years back.

zuutroy

Selby 4-0 to an amateur! Still only 7/4 to win it though.

Frank O. Pinion

zuutroy wrote: »

Selby 4-0 to an amateur! Still only 7/4 to win it though.

That amateur is only 22, and a "former pro". He also got to the last 16 of the 2014 UK Championship when he was only 18.

zuutroy

He seems decent. Very poor miss by Selby to fail to drag it back to 4-2. Such a lucky kiss on the black for Cahill to take it.

Joe_ Public

Astonishing miss on the pink by Selby to go 1-5 behind. It was a thinnish cut but not that difficult really. Seen him pull out of a few tricky situations before but hard to fancy this one the way he’s playing.

ArmaniJeanss

Beaten 6-3.

Joe_ Public

Good pot on the pink but not at all in favour of that last safety Selby played, deserved to be punished. Obviously got a bit of game this lad, be interesting to see how he follows it up.

ArmaniJeanss

4th seed John Higgins out, beaten by fellow Scot Alan McManus 6-5.

Ultimate Seduction

BBC only showing this at stupid o clock in the morning?

xi5yvm0owc1s2b

Ultimate Seduction wrote: »

BBC only showing this at stupid o clock in the morning?

Some matches are live on the red button

Ultimate Seduction

Delaney Aggressive Bum wrote: »

Some matches are live on the red button

Red button not available here for years?

Arthur Daley

Does seem like John Higgins is getting ready to pack it in soon.

Inviere

Ultimate Seduction wrote: »

Red button not available here for years?

It’s available on FTA. It can be manually tuned in on Sky I believe?

Frank O. Pinion

Ultimate Seduction wrote: »

Red button not available here for years?

I've been watching Snooker on the BBC red button for years in Ireland, on FreeSat.

Ultimate Seduction

Does anyone know the details to 'tune in' the red button on other channels on sky box?

Arthur Daley

Great start from Ken to go 1-0 up.

Joe_ Public

Surprised this is only second head to head of their careers. Ken might end up regretting spurning that chance to go 2-0 up.

Inviere

Stellar potting from Ken, needs to get that cue ball under control though. Ronnie having a few nervy misses too

Arthur Daley

Ronnie hitting across the ball badly. Ken needs to capitalise now and get into the interval 3-1 up

Joe_ Public

Joe_ Public wrote: »

Surprised this is only second head to head of their careers. Ken might end up regretting spurning that chance to go 2-0 up.

You're just short, their 26th head-to-head today. Ken comfortably outplaying the Rocket so far.

Inviere

3 to 1 Doherty, gone to mid session. Ken will be absolutely delighted, and rightly so.

Joe_ Public

[Deleted User] wrote: »

You're just short, their 26th head-to-head today. Ken comfortably outplaying the Rocket so far.

Oh dear, not sure what I was thinking of! Just checked snooker dot org and only one previous match was listed! Sure how could that be right!!

He is rolling back the years here, ronnie not looking so sharp.

xi5yvm0owc1s2b

Ultimate Seduction wrote: »

Does anyone know the details to 'tune in' the red button on other channels on sky box?

Give these instructions a try.

https://www.horsesportireland.ie/how-to-watch-bbc-red-button-in-ireland/

Inviere

The Rocket has begun lift off procedure, Ken needs a great old run now or that’ll be it

Arthur Daley

Come on Ken. 5-5 final frame decider

Inviere

Looks like it’s curtains for Ken now unfortunately

Arthur Daley

If Ken can show up like this in the Euro competitions through to April he should be ok for top 64 surely.

Joe_ Public

Ah well...brave effort nonetheless. Surely got to draw heart from that for battles ahead. If I’m honest had that down as a 1-6 and a potential whitewash so happy to see a performance like that. Ronnie won’t go all the way playing like that all the same!

Joe_ Public

No rest for wicked as far as Ken is concerned, faces Zhang Anda a week on Tuesday in Scottish Open. Keep winning R1 matches and he should be ok, but would be nice to see a run somewhere for old times sake.

AllForIt

Fantastic break by Trump to take the final frame decider after missing the final black in the previous frame.

Trump 6 Dale 5

Frank O. Pinion

First week of the tournament is over, and we're down to the last 32.

Top half

Ronnie O'Sullivan v Zhou Yuelong
Marco Fu (ranked #16) v Jack Lisowski (ranked #17), a battle to stay/get in the Top 16 for The Masters
Tian Pengfei v Martin O'Donnell
Xiao Guodong v Ding Junhui
Judd Trump v Mark King
Joe O'Connor v Joe Perry
Lu Ning v Luca Brecel
Tom Ford v Alan McManus

Bottom half

Sunny Akani v Jak Jones
Stuart Bingham v David Gilbert
Yan Bingtao v Kyren Wilson
Gary Wilson v Barry Hawkins
Mark Allen v Hossein Vafaei
Neil Robertson v Graeme Dott
Ali Carter v Stephen Maguire
Noppon Saengkham v Mark Williams


Still 12 of the Top 16 remaining. Top half obvious choices are Ronnie and Trump, and they could very well meet in the semis. Bottom half is a little more unpredictable, I'd love for Mark Williams or Kyren Wilson to come through, or dark horse, Sunny Akani. Ronnie's match starts tomorrow at 1pm, Williams at 7pm.

The Nal

Very interesting interview with Ronnie, Hazel, Davis and Ken there after Ronnies match. No joke Davis must have made 50 different confused expressions while Ronnie was talking about breakaway tours, looking after top players etc.

OK its basically an argument now. "Steve Steve you're being silly, you're being silly now".

Great TV. Better entertainment than the match!

Joe_ Public

The Nal wrote: »

Very interesting interview with Ronnie, Hazel, David and Ken there after Ronnies match. No joke David must have made 50 different confused expressions while Ronnie was talking about breakaway tours, looking after top players etc.

Davis just sat there stupified for most of it, like he didn’t know where to begin. Then suggests maybe ronnie should retire lol.
Not sure about Ronnie’s breakaway tour but I do agree with a lot of his claims. Davis is just a hearn mouthpiece really, and I don’t think that’s being unfair.

The Nal

Frank O. Pinion

Ronnie was making some decent points about there not being much benefit for actually being a Top 16 ranked player, as opposed to years ago, and Steve or Ken couldn't articulate much of an argument against his points.

xi5yvm0owc1s2b

Davis sat there shaking his head and grimacing, but didn't have much to say in response to O'Sullivan's points about players needing to practice and prepare for matches, which they can't do while flying all around the world.

Snooker was different in Davis's heyday. There weren't many tournaments outside the UK, so players didn't have to travel much. Once a player got into the top 16, he had a free pass to at least the last 32 of any tournament. But now we have Davis trying to tell players that they should just shut up and do what Hearn says -- when I tend to agree that it's doing nobody any favors.

zuutroy

For all the sh1t Ronnie talks after matches, he made his points really well today. Often after the Eurosport matches he'll talk absolute rambling nonsense about his interest levels and god knows what else but he made a good argument today. Lost a bit of respect for Davis sitting there making faces and asking him why he doesn't retire.

Joe_ Public

Kens contribution was decent, asked the pertinent questions and let ronnie speak. Davis seemed so over anxious to play, as he put it, “devils advocate” that he never really managed to tease out the relevant points and then basically lost it with the rather glib retirement quip. Overall, good entertainment and the kind of discussion badly needed on the circuit.

Inviere

On a normal day, I've very very little interest in listening to Ronnie, and I've a lot of time for Steve...but my God Steve came across badly there, and Ronnie spoke a lot of sense. It's like Steve wasn't listening at all Ronnie was actually hugely patient, in the face of ****ty comments from Steve. I actually feel like I heard Ronnie O'Sullivan speaking as himself for the first time in years...normally he talks crap or plays games with interviewers, or is riddled with anxiety/discomfort...but he was a class act there.

Arthur Daley

But Ronnie didn't mke total sense here either. I take it he would be happy to play in 15 tournaments out of 20. The main tournaments and he can then drop 5. But he says he can't do it because he might drop out of the top 16 or 32 by doing this and he is 'better than that'.

But surely Selby and maybe Trump or Ding have skipped a few tournaments every year (certainly Selby skipped the North before). If you perform in the biggest 15 tournaments you are not likely to drop out of the top 16, let alone 32.

Typical Ronnie, has to drum up a bit of controversy. I agree with Steve really. Obviously Steve is going to see it from Hearn's point of view. But when you tease out his issues, it is a bit of a non issue to be honest.

Steve was such a machine in his heyday, he probably would have been happy with all this snooker. Actually I'd say most of the players from the 80s would just love the set up today. It has it's drawbacks, as we see with the UK, but on balance the game is doing as well as it can, and as fans we have a glut of snooker available once you tune in your satelite.