Minor Tournaments Discussion 2018/19.

Arthur Daley · 20-10-2018 11:39pm

Be happy to see M Davis get a win after 27 years on the tour. Interviewed well compared to some of the moaning and groaning out of Ronnie and Higgins this week.

Gwynplaine · 21-10-2018 2:02pm

Joe Johnson is unbearable to listen to. Watching the final on Quest here now.

Arthur Daley · 21-10-2018 9:40pm

Bingham turning the screw now. 1 up with 2 to play.

Joe_ Public · 21-10-2018 9:54pm

Been a very enjoyable final. That earlier foul on the white by davis was a huge moment. Been very little between them the whole way.

Frank O. Pinion · 22-10-2018 9:56am

Next up on the main tour is the International Championship, from 28th October - 4th November, airing on Eurosport.

However, if you want to see more snooker on TV this week, there is the 2018 UK Seniors Championship, Wednesday 24th Oct - Thursday 25th October. Airing on FreeSports, Sky 422, Virgin 553, Freesat 252.

Jimmy White (defending champion) v Dennis Taylor/Suchakree Poomjang
Ken Doherty (last year's runner up) v Cliff Thorburn/Rodney Goggins
Stephen Hendry v John Parrott/Leo Fernandez
Aaron Canavan v Joe Johnson/Igor Figueiredo

All matches until the final are best-of-5, final is a best-of-7. All matches will be played with a 30-second shot clock, with players having two time-outs per match. Re-spotted black replace final frame deciders. Winner's prize is £10,000.

ArmaniJeanss · 24-10-2018 10:03pm

Irish going well in the seniors.
Leo Fernandez beat John Parrott and Stephen Hendry to reach the semi finals.
I'm guessing the £10K winners cheque would be close to his best return in his career.
Rodney Goggins beat Cliff Thorburn and plays Ken for a place in other semi-final.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_UK_Seniors_Championship

zuutroy · 25-10-2018 8:56pm

Just put it on there. Huge crowd at it! Ken playing some bloke I've never heard of.

Frank O. Pinion · 12-11-2018 12:09pm

Northern Ireland Open starts today on EuroSport and Quest. 128 player tournament, with £70,000/ranking points to the winner. Mark Williams is the defending champion, he plays Alfie Burden in the first round.

Ronnie, who won the Champion of Champions yesterday, plays Iran's Soheil Vahedi.

Ultimate Seduction · 12-11-2018 5:37pm

Jeez that Chinese lad will be kicking himself for a long time, Hawking's gave him so many chances to win it.

Inviere · 12-11-2018 5:51pm

What channel is it on?

Ultimate Seduction · 12-11-2018 5:54pm

Inviere wrote: »

What channel is it on?

Quest. 144 on sky

Inviere · 12-11-2018 8:20pm

Ultimate Seduction wrote: »

Quest. 144 on sky

Cool, it's on FTA too in HD so happy days. Are they not covering the evening session no?

Frank O. Pinion · 12-11-2018 8:52pm

Inviere wrote: »

Cool, it's on FTA too in HD so happy days. Are they not covering the evening session no?

No Quest never covers the evening sessions until the weekend, until then the evening sessions air on EuroSport.

Very frustrating for me as I just have FreeSat.

Inviere · 12-11-2018 8:57pm

Frank O. Pinion wrote: »

Very frustrating for me as I just have FreeSat.

Yeah same here.

El_Duderino 09 · 13-11-2018 11:58am

Watched the Bingham v Lines game last night on German Eurosport (in a hotel). Terrible game. Lines was 2-1 up when I had to go to bed. It was scrappy, messy and uninspiring.

A real contrast from the great final on Sunday night do fair play to Wilson and o Sullivan for their performances.

I suppose the players can’t be at their peak for every tournament.

Joe_ Public · 13-11-2018 12:15pm

Certainly wilson was far from his peak last night losing to lee walker. Seems ridiculous you can be expected to play a final late one night, then play to midnight the next and in a different country (well, landmass at least!) Scheduling with these 128 player rounds is obviously tight but that just seems ridiculous to me.

El_Duderino 09 · 13-11-2018 2:38pm

Joe_ Public wrote: »

Certainly wilson was far from his peak last night losing to lee walker. Seems ridiculous you can be expected to play a final late one night, then play to midnight the next and in a different country (well, landmass at least!) Scheduling with these 128 player rounds is obviously tight but that just seems ridiculous to me.

The emotional strength needed to play a final to the last frame must be tough. For every peak there’s a trough. Very hard to expect a player to be switched on again the next day. But it’s not the end of the world. At least he will have a week to recover now.

Frank O. Pinion · 13-11-2018 3:33pm

Good few big names out in the first round. John Higgins, Kyren Wilson, Barry Hawkins, Stuart Bingham, and #1 ranked player for the season, Mark Allen.

Ronnie won his match 4-0, making 3 centuries. Said there was still room for improvement.

Kevin Finnerty · 13-11-2018 3:35pm

Frank O. Pinion wrote: »

Good few big names out in the first round. John Higgins, Kyren Wilson, Barry Hawkins, Stuart Bingham.

Ronnie won his match 4-0, making 3 centuries. Said there was still room for improvement.

Some going trying to beat a 10 second shot time average... he averaged just under 14. Very hard to watch Selby Hamilton after that performance from o Sullivan.

Joe_ Public · 13-11-2018 3:56pm

In commentary Foulds described that contest as Premier league against non league and the analogy was spot on. Some of the pots Vahedi missed, as a professional snooker player, were laughable, whether he was overawed or not. O’Sullivan would face tougher tests on the practice table.

El_Duderino 09 · 13-11-2018 6:34pm

Kevin Finnerty wrote: »

Some going trying to beat a 10 second shot time average... he averaged just under 14. Very hard to watch Selby Hamilton after that performance from o Sullivan.

That’s an incredible shot average. I find it very hard to watch Selby when there are much more exciting players out there.

Selby’s good, no doubt. But he’s hard to watch.

zuutroy · 14-11-2018 8:49pm

Ronnie playing crazy exhibition stuff tonight.

Kevin Finnerty · 14-11-2018 9:16pm

zuutroy wrote: »

Ronnie playing crazy exhibition stuff tonight.

Only saw the first frame. Seemed impatient. Mie had his chances

Joe_ Public · 14-11-2018 10:48pm

Think Ronnie’s just a bit bored with these non event matches, trying something to liven it up a bit. John Higgins seems depressed recently, MJW said before today’s match he’d prefer to be on the golf course and that’s where he’ll be tomorrow if it takes his fancy.

Ultimate Seduction · 15-11-2018 12:23am

Joe_ Public wrote: »

Think Ronnie’s just a bit bored with these non event matches, trying something to liven it up a bit. John Higgins seems depressed recently, MJW said before today’s match he’d prefer to be on the golf course and that’s where he’ll be tomorrow if it takes his fancy.

Ya, he's been on a bit of a rant all week on Twitter about it, especially winning a tournament Sunday night then having to play a "numpty" on Monday. I kind of knew he would come out aggressive. Great to watch.

ArmaniJeanss · 15-11-2018 12:43am

Joe_ Public wrote: »

Certainly wilson was far from his peak last night losing to lee walker. Seems ridiculous you can be expected to play a final late one night, then play to midnight the next and in a different country (well, landmass at least!) Scheduling with these 128 player rounds is obviously tight but that just seems ridiculous to me.

I know that in Tennis (which also operates under a schedule of Monday to Sunday tournament followed by another Monday to Sunday tournament) they have some sort of flexible bye system where finalists in the first tournament get to skip the first round in the second tournament. That the actual players involved obviously aren't known until quite late doesn't affect it.
I'm not sure of the exact mechanism (must be some sort of draw rejigging) but I'm sure something similar could be done in snooker.

Joe_ Public · 15-11-2018 12:57am

ArmaniJeanss wrote: »

I know that in Tennis (which also operates under a schedule of Monday to Sunday tournament followed by another Monday to Sunday tournament) they have some sort of flexible bye system where finalists in the first tournament get to skip the first round in the second tournament. That the actual players involved obviously aren't known until quite late doesn't affect it.
I'm not sure of the exact mechanism (must be some sort of draw rejigging) but I'm sure something similar could be done in snooker.

They could do something for sure. They could have ensured, for example, that nobody playing in the champion of champions was scheduled to play on the first day this week. That’d have sorted the issue but I guess that just didn’t occur to people.

Don’t know about other sports but schedule is critical to players in snooker because so many of them are budgeting for the cheapest flights, hotel deals etc. Guys particularly lower down the rankings mightn’t be that enthusiastic about sudden tweaks to accommodate those more likely to go deep in tournaments. That said, what happened to Kyren just isn’t acceptable in my book though, as someone said above, losing here might not be the worst thing for him in the long run.

Frank O. Pinion · 15-11-2018 9:42am

Thursday. The day of these "Home Nations" events, where we start the day with 32 players, but by the end of today, we'll have the 8 quarter-finalists.

Top half of draw:

Ali Carter/Xiao Guodong v Joe Swail/Eden Sharav
Li Hang/Neil Robertson v Mark Davis/Peter Ebdon
Judd Trump/Jack Lisowski v Luca Brecel/Gary Wilson
Robin Hull/Ryan Day v Andrew Higginson/Billy Joe Castle

Bottom half of draw:

Ronnie O'Sullivan/Tom Ford v Michael Holt/Zhou Yuelong
Lu Ning/Hammad Miah v Matthew Stevens/David Gilbert
Chris Totten/Thepchaiya Un-Nooh v Robbie Williams/Sanderson Lam
Scott Donaldson/Martin O'Donnell v Hamza Akbar/Mark Selby

From what I've seen Ronnie and Selby have been playing the best, and could very well meet in the semis, and go on the win the tournament. But that top half, try picking a finalist from that. Robertson? Trump? I'd like Lisowski to beat Trump, and come through to the final. He's been having a great season so far. He's ranked #17, and is trying to get some results to get into the Top 16 in time for the Masters.

Joe_ Public · 15-11-2018 10:51am

The third meeting between Trump and Lisowski in less than a month. Should in theory be a mouth watering contest but they’ve generally produced poor matches for whatever reason. As friends and practice partners they’ve both spoken about how hard it is to play against each other which isn’t something you’d expect to hear from a Ronnie O’Sullivan or John Higgins.

Anyway hope this one measures up. Lisowski has made sharp progress this season but was lucky enough to survive against Liam Highfield last night. Trump looks in mean shape this week, not sure why he wants to engage in verbals with KyrenWilson, but if it helps him focus then all is good. He’s my pick this week, but I have been wrong before!

Frank O. Pinion · 15-11-2018 5:38pm

Neil Robertson and Jack Lisowski out. 32 down to 16...

Top half of draw:

Ali Carter v Eden Sharav
Li Hang v Peter Ebdon
Judd Trump v Luca Brecel
Ryan Day v Andrew Higginson

Bottom half of draw:

Ronnie O'Sullivan v Zhou Yuelong
Lu Ning v David Gilbert
Thepchaiya Un-Nooh v Robbie Williams
Martin O'Donnell v Mark Selby

Minor Tournaments Discussion 2018/19.

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