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Year: 2017

The Bulgarian Tour 2017 – Burgas

Monique Snooker Legends event

Ronnie won the fourth and last leg of the Bulgarian Tour 2017, beating Stephen Hendry by 6-4. He wins the series by 3-1.

I was due back to Greece, and I missed the action. So there will be no pictures from me this time. Judging by images shared by Jason Francis on twitter, they had a hard day of preparation:

The match was played outdoor, which must have been nice in the Bulgarian weather, but very unusual. It has to be said, playing under the lights, when the outside temperature is near 30°C isn’t that great. On the previous days, both players came out of the arena totally wet through with sweat.

I haven’t seen the match (yet) obviously but if Jason Francis’ report on twitter is anything to go by, it was another high quality affair:

  • Outdoors tonight in Burgas, first time for everything

BulgariaTourDay4Setup-4

  • 57 from Ronnie 1-0
  • Hendry 116 to go 1-1. Playing like a dream in the balls
  • Ros century 104 leads 2/1
  • 87 from Hendry and its 2-2 at the break. Great standard
  • Hendry goes 3-2 up but Ronnie 50 up in frame 6
  • 3/3 here in Burgas
  • Another century from 125 to lead 4-3

BulgariaTourDay4Action-1

  • 87 from Ronnie 4-4 now. Ridiculous standard here. Maybe outdoors is the future 😎
  • Ronnie 5-4
  • Ronnie wins 6-4 and takes the series 3/1

And some more pictures of the setup shared by Stephen Hendry on Instagram

And of the action, shared on twitter by fans

And here is the match:

MissingClip

and this mini clip about the show

I’m very happy that the series wasn’t one-sided. It would have been if Stephen had played like he did last season in Scunthorpe. But it’s obvious that he’s been working hard on his game and he will be a handful for everybody on the Seniors tour this season. It’s also great to see him enjoying the game again.

The Bulgarian Tour 2017 – Varna

Monique Snooker Legends event

BulgariaTourDay3Varna

The Bulgarian Tour hit the beautiful city of Varna (picture shared by Jason Francis).

In the third leg, Ronnie beat Stephen Hendry by 6-4. The boys went serious last night as for each of them there was only one goal: to win. The result? A high quality encounter that got tense towards the end, Ronnie had two centuries, 107 and 100, Stephen hit breaks of 90 and 97.  They went for 3 maximum attempts between them too.  Ronnie built a 3-1 lead before the interval, but was pegged back to 4-4; he looked set to go 5-3 ahead when he potted the final black, only to go in-off and hand the frame to his opponent. Both made probably more mistakes in the last 2 frames than in the first 8, but it was Ronnie who prevailed eventually by 6-4.

Here are the pictures I took on the night:

Stephen Hendry played really well in Sofia and in Varna. He’s a totally different player now than he was last spring in Scunthorpe. He said on twitter last night that he enjoyed playing despite the defeat. That said, we shouldn’t expect a return to the main tour. Stephen was interviewed before the match yesterday and asked the question. The answer was immediate: a unequivocial NO. But he might play in the odd event if offered the opportunity.

Here is the match:

MissingClip

and a mini clip about the show

The first part of the first frame is missing. Stephen was on a maxi attempt after knocking in a long red.

Tonight they will be in Burgas for the final leg. It will be either 2-2, in which case Oleg Velinov, the promoter might request a decider, or 3-1 to Ronnie. Your pick?

But before that, yesterday evening, it was time to relax…

The Bulgarian Tour 2017 – Sofia

Monique Snooker Legends event

Day 2 of the Bulgarian Tour 2017 started with a visit to the National stadium and a great lunch in Sofia, with friend Oleg Velinov and his family.

In the evening, things got serious as Ronnie and Hendry treated the fans to a great match. The venue was packed! It was Stephen Hendry who emerged the winner by 6-5.

Ronnie started well, with a century. But Stephen was determined to prove that he can still play, and prove it, he did! He won 4 frames on the trot to lead 4-1, with a 115 in frame 5 (it could have been a 142 TC). Ronnie responded with 69, to reduce his deficit, only for Stephen to restore his 3 frames advantage and lead 5-2. With his back against the wall, Ronnie produced and forced a decider. Ronnie was first in the decider, and lead by 64. He was on a maxi attempt (not for the first time that evening!). His only option to keep the break going at that stage was a tricky plant in a middle bag. He missed it. Stephen came to the table with 83 on and nothing really safe. He duly cleared with 78 to win.

This was by far the best Stephen has been playing for a very long time. It’s absolutely clear to me that his pride has been hurt by the poor performances he produced in the Seniors World Championship last season, and in exhibitions. I have no doubt that he is out to put things right! The competitive animal has woken up.

Ronnie on the other hand was clearly in exhibition mood. He went for I-don’t-know-how-many maxi attempts during the evening, at the expense of winning at all costs but to the delight of the crowd. He was also in a hurry … helping Desislava Boshilova to reset the balls between frames, and even taking the white gloves away from her and offering her his cue for the break-off. She left Stephen in an absolutely horrific situation! Both players signed autographs for the fans.

The probable reason for Ronnie’s “hurry” became clear to me when, after the match, his first word coming back to the player’s room was “food!”.  More pictures of food can be found on Ronnie’s instagram, along with some funny/silly selfies with matching comments.

Here are the pictures I took on the evening:

The match was streamed on sportal.bg so maybe the videos will become available later today. Watch this space.

Here is a short clip about the show

Today, we all head to Varna for another great night of snooker.

The Bulgaria Tour 2017 – Plovdiv

Monique Snooker Legends event

Ronnie and Stephen Hendry arrived in Bulgaria yesterday for a 4 days tour.

Eleven30BulgariaPosterSept2017

They landed in Sofia, where they were made very welcome, before heading to Plovdiv for the first of four matches, played under the Eleven30 format (best of 11, 30 seconds shot-clock). Ronnie won by 6-1 but the players agreed to play some extra for the crowd.

Here are a few pictures taken at their arrival in Sofia and shared by Jason on Facebook.

There were about 1000 persons watching, more than in a packed Crucible, but they were seated in a 4000 capacity venue so it didn’t feel like a big crowd which is a bit of a pity.

The highlight of the evening was a 138 by Ronnie (well, a 131 in fact, as he went in-off). You can watch the second half of this break in this video shared by Jason on Facebook.

Ronnie had a 89 in frame 6 as well.

And, of course, the ref on duty was Bulgaria’s very own Proletina Velichova (pictures shared by Jacklina Simova)

Please check the comments section: great finds by krdlr! Thank you!

This is the match (Bulgarian commentary):

And there is also this short clip

About betting …

Monique Other sports, Snooker ,

Yesterday, Ronnie took part in a panel about the relationship between betting and sport as reported here :

Snooker Betting Forum launches in London

September 4, 2017

Fifty betting executives came to Sports Bar and Grill in Marylebone, London, for SBC’s inaugural Snooker Betting Forum.

Snooker Betting Forum launches in LondonA panel talked about the relationship between snooker and betting with five-times world champion Ronnie O’Sullivan, pictured left.

Hilly Ehrlich, CEO of BetCris, said: “We were looking for a passionate and well-known ambassador and Ronnie fitted the bill perfectly”. O’Sullivan said: “Snooker is interesting to punters around the world. A lot of people love the game and want to bet on something they love whether they play or not”.

Keith O’Loughlin, executive vice president of Sports at NYX/Openbet, added: “The timing of snooker is critical and yields a great content window. Combined with the amount of streaming and 50 markets betting on every single outcome makes snooker very appealing to consumers.”

The panel talked about match fixing. O’Sullivan noted that its hard to make a living in the lower echelons of snooker so “players are in a tricky situation to make a living,” but said “the UK has done a great job of cleaning things up”.

A good-humoured session ended with O’Loughlin joking: “Ronnie is the only player that breaks our trading algorithms.”

Rasmus Sojmark, founder of SBC, commented: “These events are part of our strategy to engage the sports betting community with all sports. Next week sees our Betting on Sports at Olympia in London. We have 1,200-plus senior execs and almost 200 speakers across 44 sessions.”

This once again shows how big the difference is between the perception on betting in the UK, and Asia, and what it is in most countries in Western mainland Europe.

I perfectly understand how important betting is for snooker nowadays in terms of sponsoring, but I’m still convinced that this strong tie is not helping its development in mainland Europe where betting is strongly regulated and doesn’t have a very positive image. And I’m also not convinced that the quasi monopoly of betting companies as sponsoring partners is safe. Remember tobacco?

Anyway… apparently there was some time too for a bite and a game… of pool.

And on that note … Worldsnooker has just announced that the German Masters 2018 has a sponsor, D88, an Asian company with business in betting and online gaming.

 

New Rules about Tournament Withdrawals

Monique Professional snooker tournament

This was published by Worldsnooker yesterday

Wednesday 30 Aug 2017 07:51PM

Effective immediately, World Snooker is implementing a new system for withdrawals from the first round of any World Snooker ranking event. This system will provide the opportunity for replacement players to be used in events where players withdraw with sufficient notice before the first round of an event. In doing so, this will hopefully reduce the number of walkover matches in events and provide a fairer system.

Withdrawals after the proposed cut off point, which will be close of play (17:00) on the penultimate business day prior to the start of an event, will not result in a standard fine. Instead, circumstances of the reason for withdrawal will be requested and World Snooker will apply an appropriate and proportional fine taking account of the full circumstances of the withdrawal. These new rules for withdrawal are summarised below:

• Withdrawal after the closing date, but before the draw has been performed, will result in no fine imposed.

• Withdrawal after the draw has been performed, but before close of play (17:00) on the penultimate business day prior to the first day of qualifying (Proposed Cut Off Point), will result in a fine from the appropriate level of the tiered fine system, as is currently the case for all players. In these circumstances, World Snooker will seek to replace the player with the Next Highest Ranked Eligible Player, in a straight swap in the draw.

• Withdrawal after the Proposed Cut Off Point (Late Withdrawal) will result in an appropriate and proportional fine, taking account of the full circumstances of the withdrawal. In these circumstances, World Snooker WILL NOT make a place available in the draw for the next highest eligible player.

• World Snooker reserve the right, as provided within the Players Contract section 7, a, ii, to impose any such sanction against a Player as World Snooker consider appropriate at their sole discretion for a withdrawal without exceptional mitigating circumstances that is provided after the Proposed Cut Off Point.

• For the avoidance of doubt, it would be highly likely that the fine imposed for a Late Withdrawal will be higher than the fine that would have been imposed under the tiered fine system as it is considered by World Snooker that a late withdrawal is more damaging to the reputation of the sport. World Snooker will consider exceptional mitigating circumstances as part of this process and reserve the right to not impose any fine if no fine is considered appropriate.

• The ‘Next Highest Ranked Eligible Player’ will be either:
i) the next highest ranked professional player who otherwise didn’t qualify for the tournament, or
ii) the next highest ranked player on the Q School Top Up list If the next highest ranked professional player had already been afforded the opportunity to enter and compete in the tournament and had not accepted this invitation before the expressed deadline.

• An example of the Proposed Cut Off Point: the International Championship qualifiers are currently due to start on the 26th September (TUESDAY), the penultimate business day prior to the first day of qualifying will be 22nd September (FRIDAY) so any withdrawal after 17:00 on Friday 22nd September would be considered a Late Withdrawal.

• The Late Withdrawal option will not be applicable in either the Paul Hunter Classic or Gibraltar Open, or any similarly formatted Pro-Am event. In these events there will be no replacement of any player who withdraws.

• This process only applies to the first round of an event, any withdrawal after the first round of an event will automatically qualify as a Late Withdrawal and there will be no replacement player.

This is a good move in my opinion.

The Paul Hunter Classic 2017

Monique Snooker

Those who follow me on twitter and/or Facebook know where I have been last week: in Fürth at the Paul Hunter Classic. Other than the main event, one of the few still open to amateurs, there was also a Ladies ranking event, a junior event, and kind of plate competition and a national German ranking event, all this over those two sites, the Stadthalle in Fürth, and the Ballroom in Nuremberg. So a VERY busy week.

The main event was won by Michael White and here is the report on WPBSA:

Lightning Strikes In Germany

28th August 2017

Michael White won his second ranking title by beating Shaun Murphy 4-2 in the final of the Paul Hunter Classic in Fürth.

View the updated provisional seeding list

Welshman White won seven matches to take the £20,000 top prize and double his tally of ranking crowns, having won his first at the 2015 Indian Open.

The 26-year-old from Neath had been on a poor run of form, failing to reach a quarter-final in the past nine months. But White’s game came together in Germany as he knocked out World Champion Mark Selby on his way to the final before beating world number five Murphy.

The player nicknamed Lightning jumps four places in the rankings to 26th.

Defeat for Murphy was his second in a ranking final within five days, as he was denied the China Championship title by Luca Brecel last Tuesday.

White won the opening frame with breaks of 34 and 45. Murphy had a chance to level in the second but missed the last red along the top cushion when trailing by 17 points, and his opponent punished him to lead 2-0.

Murphy pulled one back with a run of 84 but he missed a tricky brown early in frame four which let White in for an 83 to go 3-1 ahead. Frame five came down to the colours and White had a chance to clear from the yellow for victory, but rattled the last black in the jaws of a top corner and left it for Murphy to close to 3-2.

But White put that out of his mind and made a superb 97 in frame six to clinch the title.

“It means the world to me,” said White, who was 3-1 down in his opening match against Adam Duffy and came back to win 4-3. “The last couple of years have been a struggle because I have not competed with the top boys, or even felt that I was able to. But I have put a lot of work in and it has paid off.

“When I missed the black in the fifth frame I didn’t feel that I could make a break after that. I dug as deep as I could.”

Murphy, who banks £10,000, said: “Michael was just better than me from the first shot. This event is special because the fans are the best in the world.”

Earlier in the semi-finals, Murphy came from 3-1 down to beat Jamie Jones 4-3 with breaks of 90, 75 and 77 in the last three frames. White scored a 4-1 win over Mitchell Mann, who had never previously been beyond the last 32 of a ranking event.

Victory for White could also earn him a place in the Champion of Champions in November, though that will depend on results in the remaining qualifying events.

Reanne Evans won the Ladies event (report on WPBSA)

Evans Claims Women’s Classic in Germany

27th August 2017

Reanne Evans has won the 2017 WLBS Paul Hunter Women’s Classic in Germany, defeating Hong Kong’s Ng On Yee 4-1 in the final.

The pair met in what was a repeat of last year’s final at the Stadthalle, having both survived close semi-finals on Saturday evening.

11-time world champion Evans was bidding to claim her her first WLBS ranking title since January and made the stronger start, a break of 59 giving her the opening frame before she won a scrappy second frame to double her advantage.

On Yee however, has earned a reputation on the women’s circuit in recent years for her comebacks in matches and hit back by taking the third to halve the deficit. The defending champion looked all set to level the scoreline at 2-2, only for Evans to force a snooker on the pink and eventually snatch a frame that she never looked like winning with a piece of good fortune on the black ball.

Evans went on to dominate the final frame to complete a 4-1 victory and win her latest WLBS title.

Last 16 Results

Ng On Yee 4-0 Inese Lukasevsaka
Diana Schuler 0-4 Diana Stateczny
Dong Mei Mei 4-3 Linda Erben
So Man Yan 4-0 Manon Melief
Rebecca Kenna 4-0 Aimee Benn
Wan Ka Kai 4-0 Christina Schneider
Maria Catalano 4-0 Stephanie Daughtery
Reanne Evans 4-0 Ramona Kirchner

Quarter-final Results

Ng On Yee 4-0 Diana Stateczny
Fong Mei Mei 2-4 So Man Yan
Rebecca Kenna 4-0 Wan Ka Kai
Maria Catalano 1- Reanne Evans

Semi-final Results

Ng On Yee 4-3 So Man Yan
Reanne Evans 4-2 Rebecca Kenna

Final

Reanne Evans 4-1 Ng On Yee

The Junior event was won by a young French, Brian Ochoiski, who beat another young French, Niel Vincent (report on Worldsnooker)

Friday 25 Aug 2017 02:25PM

Two French players reached the final of the under-18 event at the Paul Hunter Classic in Germany this week, with Brian Ochoiski taking the title with a 4-1 win over Niel Vincent.

The tournament drew players from around Europe, but in the end the only two French players in the competition both got to the final.

Highest break of the event was a 92 from Austria’s Florian Nüßle.

Results (last 16 onwards)

Last 16
Hamim Hussain 3-0 Oliver Read
Niel Vincent 3-0 Kevin Cizmarovic
Umut Dikme 3-2 Antoni Kowalski
Florian Nüßle 3-0 Fabian Haken
Halim Hussain 3-1 Luis Vetter
Brian Ochoiski 3-1 Luke Pinches
Daniel Sciborski 3-0 Reggie Edwards
Noah Kodri 3-1 Ales Herout

Quarter-finals
Vincent 3-1 Hussain
Dikme 3-2 Nüßle
Ochoiski 3-2 Hussain
Sciborski 3-0 Kodri

Semi-finals
Vincent 4-2 Dikme
Ochoiski 4-1 Sciborski

Final
Ochoiski 4-1 Vincent

And all the pictures I took as the week unfolded 

PHC 2017 Amateur Rounds – 22.08.2017

PHC 2017 Amateur Rounds – 23.08.2017

PHC 2017 Amateur Rounds – 24.08.2017

The Ladies – Groups Stages- 24.08.2017

The Ladies – Group Stages  & last 16 – 25.08.2017

The Ladies Quarter Finals

The Ladies Semi Finals

The Ladies Final

Now a few thoughts…

The Paul Hunter Classic started as a pro-am, was taken over by Worldsnooker, evolved into a PTC and now a full ranking event. However, unfortunately, the prize money and the format are still those of a PTC. It’s only £20000 for the winner, it’s best of 7 all along. Also it’s not televised, just streamed. As a consequence, a lot of top players gave it a miss, which is a shame because it’s a great atmosphere and, according to many players, the best crowd they play in front. Barry Hearn puts the blame on the European sponsors, or rather the lack of them. But maybe he could ask himself why sponsors are not that interested? Why would an European  sponsor want to promote an event that is not on television, that is played during the summer holidays, that doesn’t seem to attract the big names AND that is organised by a body that has very strong ties with the betting industry, an industry that hasn’t a good image in mainland Europe, where betting is seen as a rather shady business, with a lot of products deemed illegal, and betting related advertising  forbidden in many european countries? It’s a catch 22 situation and it’s a big, big shame because it’s a great event and I’m not sure how long it can survive the way it goes.

It’s also a shame because, as we have seen in the amateur rounds, we have excellent young players emerging in France, Belgium and Germany. The crowd was there, massive, knowledgeable and enthusiast from day one. Mainland Europe deserves more events, and, maybe, it would be worth to put some thinking into how this European market is different from UK or Asia, and how to tweak the UK model to make one that works better in Europe.

One who didn’t give it a miss is Shaun Murphy, who traveled back from Guangzhou, through 5 different transports, to play on the first day of the event … and reached the final. Well done Shaun. Well done of course also to Michael White, who has gone through difficult times, suffering with depression, but is now back and a winner! He’s also a good person who took time to come and support disability snooker earlier this season and I was very pleased to see him lift the trophy on Sunday night.

The only thing I found “not so great” was that table one was only available for those who had paid for an additional ticket. I know that the organisers need to make a profit, but is this really the way? I could understand this to be the case on the last day, but on the first two days, with nine other tables on offer, with excellent views, why would people want to buy a (not cheap) additional ticket? In fact most didn’t and table one was often poorly attended, with no atmosphere and not looking great on streaming. Not great for the players either… Worse, even the other players and the referees were not allowed to watch there unless they also were willing to fork more money. Those are the persons who MAKE the tournament ffs! Anyway…

And a last thing … I met a fan there, a reader of this blog. I want to apologise to her for not giving her more time. I would gladly have stayed for a chat, had I not been hurrying towards the tables where the ladies semi finals had just started and where I was due to take pictures. I think it was Ute, and I’m not even certain because my hearing is very poor and it was very noisy. Next time we meet, I owe you a drink …