Martin O’Donnell has won the second event of the 2022/23 Q-Tour. He now tops the table, with the same number of points as Ross Muir who has won Event 1. George Pragnell is third despite being the most consistent player in the series so far: he was the losing finalist in both events.
The event represented the second stop of the season on what has become established as snooker’s premier amateur tour, with two places on the World Snooker Tour to be won at the end of the campaign.
Former world number 32 O’Donnell began his quest on Saturday morning with victories against Jamie Wilson, Liam Graham and Florian Nuessle to qualify for what would prove to be a dramatic final day.
In his quarter-final he defeated fellow former professional Daniel Wells 4-3 following a tight deciding frame, before he repeated the feat against Ashley Carty having at one stage needed two snookers.
Awaiting him in the final would be Event 1 runner-up George Pragnell, who himself had survived two deciding-frame finishes on the final day to edge out Hamim Hussain and former World Snooker Federation Junior champion Gao Yang to reach his second consecutive Q Tour final.
The title match would prove to be a cagey affair early on as O’Donnell took the opening two frames, before Pragnell claimed the third to establish a foothold in the contest.
From there, however, Pragnell would score just a further 10 points as O’Donnell found his groove. Breaks of 54 and 71 were enough to see him claim a 3-1 lead at the mid-session interval, before he added the following two highlighted by a final frame clearance of 135 to crown victory.
The success ensures that O’Donnell will move to top spot in the Q Tour rankings after two events, level with Event 1 champion Ross Muir, with the pair just £250 ahead of the two-time finalist Pragnell.
The 2022/23 Q Tour season continues with Event 3 which will be held at the Delta Moon venue in Mons, Belgium from 14-16 October 2022.
Following his defeat in this event Michael Georgiou came on social media, saying that he doesn’t enjoy competing anymore and that he would concentrate on coaching in the future, no more on competition. I’m wishing him the best in the future, whatever he decides to do. The tone of his posts was quite downbeat.
Ben Hancorn also hinted at putting an end to his professional ambitions. Ben stated that he had enjoyed his time on the tour and was proud of what he had achieved but that he feels it’s now time to move on. Ben proudly stressed that he is undefeated against Ronnie. Indeed they played just one match, in the 2021 Pro-Series and Ben won it by 2-1 … Ronnie made a 141 in the frame he won. All in good spirit.
The next Q-Tour event will be played in Belgium, in Mons. It’s a bit of an oddity because Mons is in the French speaking area of Belgium and snooker is mainly played in Flanders, the Dutch speaking area of Belgium. On the other hand, Mons is close to the French border, and easily accessible – both by car and train – from the Western and Southern part of Germany.
Ronnie O'Sullivan 