Redcafe Snooker

Bit of a joke that's a ranking event really, even Judd Trump said it shouldn't be and almost gave the impression he would be embarrassed to add it to his list, although of course he would take it as it takes him one step closer to becoming a hall of famer, to use an American term (still needs more World titles for that anyway).

Tour Championship starts today, a rare event in that it contains multi-session matches prior to the final.

But a good one, top 8 players on the 1-year list and what a match to start with - Higgins v O'Sullivan, looks set to go 2-2...Hopefully an exciting finish later!
 
Finally, I can watch some snooker after a bit of a hiatus! It's come at a great time, too.
 
ChrisNelson said:
Bit of a joke that's a ranking event really, even Judd Trump said it shouldn't be and almost gave the impression he would be embarrassed to add it to his list, although of course he would take it as it takes him one step closer to becoming a hall of famer, to use an American term (still needs more World titles for that anyway).

Tour Championship starts today, a rare event in that it contains multi-session matches prior to the final.

But a good one, top 8 players on the 1-year list and what a match to start with - Higgins v O'Sullivan, looks set to go 2-2...Hopefully an exciting finish later!
Click to expand...


Mark Williams in his interview after winning it yesterday kept telling the host that it's not really a ranking event while the host kept trying to say but well it is
 
Ayush_reddevil said:
Mark Williams in his interview after winning it yesterday kept telling the host that it's not really a ranking event while the host kept trying to say but well it is
Click to expand...

Well it's the first time I've agreed with Mark Williams.

We had a bit of a spat last year on Twitter and I had half of Wales sending me abuse!
 
Mrs Smoker said:
Awesome! What was it about?
Click to expand...

I've always found him a bit irritating. He's one of those people who thinks he's really funny, like everything he does and says will be met with roaring laughter.

But to be honest I think he comes across as a bit boring in his interviews, and although I didn't exactly say that I sort of implied it.... and from memory I think he retweeted the original comment plus about 3 or 4 where I was trying to explain myself!

Then he also retweeted and commented on multiple replies from Welsh sports fans who obviously leapt to his defence and my notifications went insane!

None of it was heated or anything, but I got some proper stick for it!
 
Fantastic sport. If I ever get fed up with football, snooker and NBA it would be.
 
Hendry has been off tour for several years now and he was well off the pace in his comeback match against Matt Selt and his only match before the qualifier is in the Irish Senior Masters against Cliff Thorburn (White is also playing in this tournament).

White has never dropped off tour and although he's not the player he was, out of the two he has much more recent experience in competitive snooker. He's played 25 matches on tour this year against 1 for Hendry.

I will watch it on the Eurosport Player, I suppose it's a little late to move all their scheduling around now and put it on the main channels but you could easily sell out the Crucible for it!
 
I was a big fan of Stephen Hendry and although I liked White's attacking game I never really warmed to him as a person and the more it became an either team Hendry or team White thing, the more I supported Hendry. So I'll be hoping he somehow wins that match at least.

There's no way he's going to get to the Crucible this season. I was hoping he'd win one or two games but I'd be surprised. I'd love his comeback to go well, although I'm not expecting it to - I think he'll struggle next season and probably retire after a second failed attempt in the World Championships qualifiers.

It's amazing that he's drawn two out of two people that he's either friends with or has practiced with - given how he avoided developing friendships on the circuit during his heyday. I'm really glad he avoided either of the top ranked women they let enter the men's tournament (and that take two of the places from the financially struggling lower ranked male players). The last thing I wanted was another false 'battle of the sexes' were a top ranked female in their prime takes on an ageing, 'retired' male player.
 
Jimmy White was one of my big heroes growing up and I always supported him no matter who he was playing.

But you have to have respect for what Hendry achieved. A large portion of current snooker fans are huge Ronnie fans and can't see past him but peak Hendry vs. peak O'Sullivan would be a bloody good game and I'd back Hendry to grind him down. He was that good he could frustrate even the greatest attacking players - exhibit A being his WC final victories over White.

I think in Hendry's favour is the shorter form of the matches - they are normally best of 19 throughout however this year only the final round is, before that it's best of 11.

There are some belting potential ties in the final round of qualifying, including (if higher seeds win right through) Milkins vs. Maflin, Saengkham vs. Ford, Dott vs. Akani, Day vs. Walden, Carter vs. O'Donnell, Stevens vs. Xiao and Brecel vs. Bingham!

Absolutely mad that because of his ban, Bingham finds himself qualifying only 6 years on from being World Champion.
 
ChrisNelson said:
There are some belting potential ties in the final round of qualifying, including (if higher seeds win right through) Milkins vs. Maflin, Saengkham vs. Ford, Dott vs. Akani, Day vs. Walden, Carter vs. O'Donnell, Stevens vs. Xiao and Brecel vs. Bingham!

Absolutely mad that because of his ban, Bingham finds himself qualifying only 6 years on from being World Champion.
Click to expand...
Yeah, it's crazy seeing Bingham as a qualifier.

I want some of the European players to kick on - especially Brecel and Ursenbacher - so I was gutted to see they potentially play Bingham and Carter in the last round. Two players who could easily still be top 16. Great matches for a neutral, though. And, as you say, there's some other potential crackers there if the results go as expected.
 
Bertie Wooster said:
Yeah, it's crazy seeing Bingham as a qualifier.

I want some of the European players to kick on - especially Brecel and Ursenbacher - so I was gutted to see they potentially play Bingham and Carter in the last round. Two players who could easily still be top 16. Great matches for a neutral, though. And, as you say, there's some other potential crackers there if the results go as expected.
Click to expand...

I agree with you regarding European players but I just think the way China has kicked on in the last decade or so means they are only going to dominate more and more.

It's so robotic over there, the number of coaches and amount of time they spend playing is insane and I think we're struggling to keep up.

Having said that I think the depth of quality is very high, Bingham vs. Carter could easily be a semi-final in the main draw yet they both potentially very tough matches just to even reach the Crucible.

I always enjoy watching the qualifiers so I'm looking forward to seeing how they play out this year, it's just such a shame no one will be able to watch Hendry vs. White live.
 
Ayush_reddevil said:
This is the worst Judd has played in the last 3 years
Click to expand...
Yeah, and I'm really not liking it. I'm clinging to the hope he'll suddenly go through the gears the way he often does, but he's not normally playing as badly as this. His body language isn't great either.

I was really looking forward to this tournament but, having lost Jack already, I really don't want to see Judd go out in the first round as well.
 
Mrs Smoker said:
Qualifiers are again best of 11, that just sucks.
Click to expand...

Final round are best of 19, as they should be.

Very poor from Judd yesterday but Hawkins always plays better against higher ranked players, I'd back him more to beat someone like Trump than I would someone from the local club!

Should be a good match today between Robertson and Selby, hope it's close going in to the evening session.
 
ChrisNelson said:
Well it's the first time I've agreed with Mark Williams.

We had a bit of a spat last year on Twitter and I had half of Wales sending me abuse!
Click to expand...
ChrisNelson said:
I agree with you regarding European players but I just think the way China has kicked on in the last decade or so means they are only going to dominate more and more.

It's so robotic over there, the number of coaches and amount of time they spend playing is insane and I think we're struggling to keep up.

Having said that I think the depth of quality is very high, Bingham vs. Carter could easily be a semi-final in the main draw yet they both potentially very tough matches just to even reach the Crucible.

I always enjoy watching the qualifiers so I'm looking forward to seeing how they play out this year, it's just such a shame no one will be able to watch Hendry vs. White live.
Click to expand...
They are not dominating at the moment, nowhere near it!
 
Bondi77 said:
They are not dominating at the moment, nowhere near it!
Click to expand...

I agree, my post says they will dominate more and more - I was talking more about the future than the present.

If you look at the ages of say the top 50 in the world, there are very few youngsters. That top 50 over the next few years will start to slip down the rankings, and I don't think there is an array of young British or European talent waiting to take their place.

The Chinese conveyor belt of talent will replace these older players with the new generation as time goes on - and if an Asian player wins a World Championship (Yan being the front running candidate at present) they will start to become even stronger.
 
ChrisNelson said:
I agree, my post says they will dominate more and more - I was talking more about the future than the present.

If you look at the ages of say the top 50 in the world, there are very few youngsters. That top 50 over the next few years will start to slip down the rankings, and I don't think there is an array of young British or European talent waiting to take their place.

The Chinese conveyor belt of talent will replace these older players with the new generation as time goes on - and if an Asian player wins a World Championship (Yan being the front running candidate at present) they will start to become even stronger.
Click to expand...
100% agree.
I've been saying the same myself to mates who are fellow fans but who seem to think they won't dominate because they haven't so far.

But, as you say, there's plenty of young Chinese talent all working their way up the rankings while the British ones above them are mostly 40+. It's clearly a matter of time before they overtake them in the top 32/16.

If it was America doing it, there'd be more of an awareness of it and it seen as a negative. The same attitude should be adopted with a huge, wealthy country like China taking over the sport. I'm desperate for some young British / European stars to come through and look like challenging the young Chinese for the next 20+ years, but apart from the Trump, Wilson, Allen, Lisowski, McGill group of 30 year olds, there's very few early 20 year olds or teenagers looking like coming through.
 
ChrisNelson said:
I agree, my post says they will dominate more and more - I was talking more about the future than the present.

If you look at the ages of say the top 50 in the world, there are very few youngsters. That top 50 over the next few years will start to slip down the rankings, and I don't think there is an array of young British or European talent waiting to take their place.

The Chinese conveyor belt of talent will replace these older players with the new generation as time goes on - and if an Asian player wins a World Championship (Yan being the front running candidate at present) they will start to become even stronger.
Click to expand...
Probably would have been better if you said they will dominate in the future as the more and more reference seems to me that it is current and will only be exagerated but I agree with you as figures do not lie.
 
Great performance from Robertson today.

Shame there's been no final frame deciders yet, and a few too many one sided games - but it was a good effort from Selby to hammer Wilson, and an even better effort from Robbo to hammer Selby.
 
Very impressive from Neil. At this form he is one of the favourites for the upcoming world championship. And given Judd is likely past his best form this year, maybe Neil will actually win it again
 
Ayush_reddevil said:
Incredible end to the match . Feel bad for Hawkins who really became so nervous at the end
Click to expand...
I wanted Ronnie to win, and was pleased he did it, but, yeah, it was also a shame to see Hawkins bottle it in the same way as Jack Lisowski keeps doing.

Lisowski's failings gets mentioned a lot but he's on for a career similar to someone like Hawkins, who is a very talented all round player, top 16, but has only won 3 ranking tournaments by the age of 41, and none of the big ones, and seems to also lack the bottle / belief on the biggest occasions.
 
Top quality session, and set up perfectly for tonight.

I'd prefer Robbo to win, but it'd be a shame to see O'Sullivan lose yet another final this season so happy with either winning. Just hope the high standard continues tonight.
 
Absolute train wreck of a performance from Ronnie this evening.

Hate it when finals are this one-sided.
 
Great performance from Robertson to keep up such a high standard throughout all 3 matches (beating Selby 10-3 and then O'Sullivan 10-4 is a hell of an effort).

Ronnie managed to keep up with him in the afternoon in a brilliant level of Snooker but was really poor tonight. That's no titles and 5 final defeats in the season so far for Ronnie.
 
He also lost 5 out of his 7 group matches in the Pro Series a couple of weeks ago (and conceded a frame in another match due to turning up late).

Some of his defeats in those finals have been very heavy too, 9-3 in the Scottish Open to Selby, 10-3 in the Players Championship to Higgins and now 10-4 last night.

I wonder when was the last time Ronnie lost 6 frames in a row, or an entire session. Can't have happened for a while.

It will be interesting to see who he draws at the Crucible as there will be some tough potential opponents for him.
 
Well the other way of looking at it is that he made 5 Ranking finals this season after winning the world championship. He obviously is making mistakes these days and the top players are capable of punishing them. You just never know with Ronnie though , he could knuckle down for a few weeks and look great at the crucible
 
You must log in or register to reply here.