After a two days hiatus, the 2023 ranking CLS was back yesterday … competing for attention with Wimbledon. Despite getting some help from the gods of rain, I’m not sure it worked 🤨
Here is the report shared by WST:
Woollaston And Xiao Top Groups
Ben Woollaston and Xiao Guodong both made it through to phase two of the BetVictor Championship League Snooker – Ranking Edition with fine performances at the Morningside Arena in Leicester on Monday.
Click here for the results and schedule
In Group 32, China’s Xiao opened with a 2-2 draw against Rory McLeod, and in his second match against Alexander Ursenbacher he was 1-0 behind, but hit back with breaks of 101, 123 and 50 to win 3-1. Xiao then rounded off his day with a 3-0 success against Martin Gould and he’ll be back for the next phase later this month.
Woollaston opened Group 16 with a comfortable 3-0 defeat of Liam Graham, highlighted by a break of 96 in frame three, and he was equally dominant in a 3-0 win over Peter Lines. The Leicester cueman still needed to avoid a 3-0 defeat in his last match of the day against Jimmy Robertson, and he was in danger at 2-0 down, but Woollaston crucially took frame three on the colours and added the fourth with a break of 73 for good measure to leave the result at 2-2.
The BetVictor Championship League is the first ranking event of the season and carries total prize money of £328,000. The eventual winner on July 21 will earn a place in the prestigious Champion of Champions event in Bolton from November 13-19.
Among the players in action this week are 2015 world champion Stuart Bingham, last season’s German Masters winner Ali Carter and reigning Welsh Open champion Robert Milkins.
Despite the tennis competition I watched most of the action yesterday. I was pleased to see Ben Woollaston playing well. He has struggled a lot with health issues in recent years. Xiao looked rusty in his first match but got rid of the cobwebs pretty quickly. Jimmy Robertson also struggled at the start of the day; he improved but too late and too little. Martin Gould, on the other hand was really poor.
I watched a lot of Liam Graham and I’m in two minds about what I saw. The young man has abilities and he is a fighter. That’s commendable and I liked that. On the other hand, he clearly has a lot to learn, which is normal, but I’m not sure he expected the level of opposition he had to face. He oozed frustration for most of the day and this I didn’t like, because I’m not sure this attitude will help him to learn what he has to learn and it’s a lot. I may be wrong – I hope I’m wrong – but I have the feeling that many young players, especially the young UK players, fresh from the amateur ranks, believe that they are much better than they actually are and it often backfires. Confidence is a good thing, but over-confidence isn’t. When mercilessly crushed by daily reality-checks over-confidence can be very destructive.
Anyway, this is today’s program
I will probably in the minority concentrating on table 2.
Ronnie O'Sullivan 
I viewed yesterdays action and saw good snooker poor production values with mics dropping out and everyone pretending this is anything but a bet streaming experience.
I look forward to the snookering season starting but it hasn’t started at this event in a part of the UK I’ve never even heard of.
Where are the spectators?
Well it’s in Leicester, Mark Selby’s hometown. And, no there are no spectators for this one. And, yes, you are probably right about the “betting” link. It’s sponsored by a bookie and it’s the spiritual heir of the traditional non ranking event that was and still indeed is mainly bookies oriented. I remember the time when the only way to watch it was on bookies websites.
With Liam Graham, I think a lot of the frustration comes from some of the shots he missed – really easy ones. He also found the table difficult. I was more concerned with his technique, which he will have to work on. It is possible to make these improvements in 2 years, but maybe not in time to get him anywhere near the top-64. Either way, he’s obviously very green at this level and will have a very tough time.
We might get something similar from Xing Zihao, an 18-year old from Jinhua in Zhejiang (close to Si Jiahui’s home). He’s probably the weakest of the new Chinese players. He pots a good ball but doesn’t have the control he would need at this level. He’s an academy kid who has now joined Victoria’s Academy. He got his tour card via the CBSA qualifiers, beating some very good players, but ultimately overcoming a tired and stressed Lei Peifan.