The win sees Trump move to the edge of history, with one more victory standing between him and becoming the first ever winner of a ranking event in Saudi Arabia.
Tomorrow’s final will see the Ace in the Pack take on either Mark Williams or Si Jiahui. With a top prize of £500,000 on the line, it will be snooker’s most lucrative match ever outside of the World Championship.
World number one Trump moved to the summit of the rankings last month with his run to the final of the Xi’an Grand Prix, where he came up short against World Champion Kyren Wilson.
The 2019 World Champion has been in supreme form so far this season. He and Murphy met in the final of the Shanghai Masters, where Trump secured a more comfortable 11-5 victory. Trump has now won 14 of the 15 matches he’s played this term.
Defeat for Murphy sees him depart with £100,000 for making the semi-finals. The narrow loss this afternoon will come as a bitter pill to swallow, but having already made the Shanghai final he can reflect on a strong start to the season.
Trump stated prior to today’s encounter that he needed to get on top of Murphy in the early stages. He did just that, crafting breaks of 67 and 72 on his way to a 3-0 lead. Murphy responded by taking the last before the mid-session to trail 3-1 at the break.
Murphy continued to push hard after play resumed and he took a dramatic fifth on the black to move within a single frame.
Trump regained his two frame cushion to lead 4-2 and made a break of 67 to move clear in the seventh. However, Murphy made 67 of his own and forced a re-spot. He deposited the extra ball and fist pumped after closing within a frame at 4-3. Trump then pulled clear again at 5-3, but Murphy fired in runs of 78 and 60 to force a decider.
A hugely tense final frame eventually came down to the green. Murphy spurned his chance when chasing a difficult positional shot. Trump deposited it and the brown to leave his opponent leaving two snookers. He got one of them but it was to no avail as Trump got over the line to reach his 46thranking event final.
“It was a tricky game. I threw away a couple of frames. Even though it was looking like it might turn around, I got over the line in the end with a bit of drama,” said 28-time ranking event winner Trump.
“It was difficult. He fought back well. At one point he was looking like he would win. I let it slip away at times and when you miss those chances sometimes you get punished. I managed to keep my head and get over the line.
“In the World Championship you have days off between games. After you win you have a day or two to calm yourself down and go again. Here it is important to get through as easy as possible. That was a very tough semi-final, but hopefully it wont impact me in the final.
“Whoever I play it will be a good game. I’ve had some good games over the past couple of years with both of them. Si is on the way up and Mark, in terms of age, is on the way down. He’s still very consistent and is able to adjust his game and battle with anyone. Mark is one of the top three or four players of all time and Si will be up there with the greats one day.”
Murphy said: “It is a sickener. Once you get to this stage of an event, with such prize money and prestige, you think about winning. It never really felt like the balls were going my way all match. It felt like I was trying to push water uphill. Lady luck wasn’t on my side for the majority, but Judd’s ability to keep potting balls is incredible. I think he is the best out and out potter we have ever seen.
“I am many things but I’m not a quitter. I kept trying and I couldn’t have given any more. Of course determination is only one of the ingredients you need to be a winner. Today I was lacking in a few areas and it wasn’t to be. We go again and look forward to the English Open in Brentwood.”
Shaun fought really hard, came back after Judd dominated the early stages and had a really good opportunity to win that match. He was on the colours in the decider and missed the green for victory. He will be sick! Judd Trump was certainly beatable yesterday.
Mark Williams is through to the 42nd ranking event final of his career after scoring a 6-3 win over Si Jiahui at the inaugural Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters in Riyadh.
The Welshman now faces a showdown with Judd Trump over the best of 19 frames in tomorrow’s title match.
The winner will take home £500,000, which will make it the most lucrative match ever outside of the World Championship. Victory for three-time World Champion Williams would give him the biggest payday of his career.
Williams and Trump have done battle in some of the sport’s biggest matches in recent years. In the 2022 World Championship semi-finals Williams came from 9-3 down to force a decider but lost 17-16. They then met in the 2023 Masters final, where Trump prevailed 10-8 from 8-7 down.
Defeat for Si, who beat seven-time Crucible king Ronnie O’Sullivan in the quarters, means he will continue his wait for a maiden ranking title. However, his performance does allow him to break into the top 16 in the world for the first time, moving to 13th in the provisional world rankings with the £100,000 prize money.
It was Chinese 22-year-old who started fastest, firing in a fine break of 116 to win the opener. From there it was 26-time ranking event winner Williams who took charge. Runs 60, 97 and 77 helped him to four on the bounce and a 4-1 lead.
The next two frames were shared to leave Williams one away at 5-2, before a break of 136 kept Si in contention. There was to be no fightback though, with 49-year-old Williams making a match winning 80 in the ninth to prevail 6-3.
“It’s a big win for me. I’m an old man now! I think it is bound to get me in everything up until after the Tour Championship now,” said Williams.
“My eyes are deteriorating pretty quickly. On long balls I am seeing three of them but they say to hit the one in the middle and that’s what I’m doing. I have looked at getting my eyes done, but I’m guessing alright at the moment so I’m not going to bother.
“I think I’m a better all-round player than I was 20 years ago. I wish I could have my long game from then, but I think all round I’m better now than I’ve ever been. That is what is winning me the matches.”
SEMI-FINALS HIGHLIGHTS
Here is the end of the Williams v Si match
I think that Si hit the wall last night. Maybe the sudden realisation of what could be, maybe nervous and mental fatigue or both. But all the same Willo played really really well. He’s a very shrewd player and if he can reproduce that today, Judd Trump will need to be on his best game to beat him.
Ahead of the match, Judd had criticised the current money based ranking system. It suddenly hit him that he might win five events and still not be number one because the disproportionate money on offer in this event. He’s right and I have been saying this for years. Just think about this: what if next season the Saudis decide to host the Shoot-out and offer ￡2500000 for the winner in a “winner takes all” format? The winner of that might be number one for the next two seasons, even it’s the only thing they ever win. It’s absurd. You will tell me, WST won’t accept such an offer. I wouldn’t be so sure … it may well depend on what’s in it for them, that we maybe don’t see. Don’t forget that Matchroom is a majority stakeholder in WST, and they are involved in other sports as well.
7 thoughts on “Day 8 at the 2024 Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters – SFs + some thoughts about money…”
Funny enough I thought as well Judd absolutely has to win today, so that this blown up tournament brings the fewest disturbances to the rankings. And, just as a extremely tiny sidenote, I’m sure that Judd will take the money as well. As a bonus so to speak.
I know that I am an irredeemable dreamer.
Yet, for some reason, deep in my soul, I hope that both Trump and Williams are aware of the ugliness of the situation and will secretly donate a portion of their prize money to a human rights organization which is working to improve the terrible situation in Saudi Arabia.
I don’t want to loose my faith in humanity.
Welcome Klara! Unfortunately, I’m not sure at all that they are aware of that situation. When I was around the tour, it seemed to me that snooker players are not very interested in politics, even less so in international politics. Whenever they were reading the newspapers it was always the sports’ pages.
I didn’t like the money ranking system from the beginning and would have never intruduced it. Just for privacy reasons. And why was the point system abolished? Because it was too complicated? Really? Well, then the step from money rankings to Elo will be huge for the authorities.
It was a Barry Hearn ‘initiative’. He said that the “man in the street” could understand money lists more easily (i.e. snooker fans have limited intelligence). But his real motivation was to promote the prize-money earnings of the top 1-2 players, setting a target of £1M – his definition of a ‘big’ sport. So he introduced money lists and then bled money away from the lower ranked players towards the top players, under the premise “losers shouldn’t get paid”.
Actually, if we consider 2-year lists, 1-year lists, provisional lists, points coming off after 2 years, and the completely different amounts that each tournament pay for each round, it’s actually an extremely complicated system. You can’t do any calculations without pretty sophisticated spreadsheet, and 3 years’ worth of data for each player. There are ‘ranking tournaments’, ‘non-ranking tournaments’ and in tiered events, some players get the prize-money but not the ranking points…
Because the whole system depends on professional ‘ranking tournaments’, which must comprise all players with a ‘tour card’, it completely constrains the tour to 128 players living in the UK – there aren’t the means for all those players to travel around the world for qualifier rounds. That’s not a global tour, we regularly see overseas players decide to quit the game, and those that stay don’t achieve their potential, being constantly away from home.
That was my motivation to implement a different system, which is based on a formula which is used increasingly across the sporting/gaming world. It took me one week, and I have 11000 players on my list. That’s a global system which will encourage people at all levels to come out and play.
But looking for positives from this Saudi event, one would be that the huge prize-money will distort the money list system to breaking point. This would have worked better if someone like Si Jiahui had won it; but with Trump and Williams the current ranking listing looks acceptable enough for the time being.
Other positives are the full 144-player participation at the main venue, and the high quality of the venue and its facilities. I will be in Brentwood next week, which will be very different… The events held in Saudi and China (and to an extent Germany) put the UK venues to shame, especially the Crucible. Perhaps the Saudis will show the way. I’d also mention the facilities for youth snooker that they have opened.
But the very low crowd numbers for most of the event should surely mean that it’s far too soon to think of the World Championship moving there. Perhaps after the 10-year deal comes up for renewal, but certainly not in 2028. Around 2030 we’ll get an idea how the local support is increasing, and whether the young players have maintained their interest.
Ronnie O'Sullivan 
Funny enough I thought as well Judd absolutely has to win today, so that this blown up tournament brings the fewest disturbances to the rankings. And, just as a extremely tiny sidenote, I’m sure that Judd will take the money as well. As a bonus so to speak.
I know that I am an irredeemable dreamer.
Yet, for some reason, deep in my soul, I hope that both Trump and Williams are aware of the ugliness of the situation and will secretly donate a portion of their prize money to a human rights organization which is working to improve the terrible situation in Saudi Arabia.
I don’t want to loose my faith in humanity.
Welcome Klara! Unfortunately, I’m not sure at all that they are aware of that situation. When I was around the tour, it seemed to me that snooker players are not very interested in politics, even less so in international politics. Whenever they were reading the newspapers it was always the sports’ pages.
I didn’t like the money ranking system from the beginning and would have never intruduced it. Just for privacy reasons. And why was the point system abolished? Because it was too complicated? Really? Well, then the step from money rankings to Elo will be huge for the authorities.
It was a Barry Hearn ‘initiative’. He said that the “man in the street” could understand money lists more easily (i.e. snooker fans have limited intelligence). But his real motivation was to promote the prize-money earnings of the top 1-2 players, setting a target of £1M – his definition of a ‘big’ sport. So he introduced money lists and then bled money away from the lower ranked players towards the top players, under the premise “losers shouldn’t get paid”.
Actually, if we consider 2-year lists, 1-year lists, provisional lists, points coming off after 2 years, and the completely different amounts that each tournament pay for each round, it’s actually an extremely complicated system. You can’t do any calculations without pretty sophisticated spreadsheet, and 3 years’ worth of data for each player. There are ‘ranking tournaments’, ‘non-ranking tournaments’ and in tiered events, some players get the prize-money but not the ranking points…
Because the whole system depends on professional ‘ranking tournaments’, which must comprise all players with a ‘tour card’, it completely constrains the tour to 128 players living in the UK – there aren’t the means for all those players to travel around the world for qualifier rounds. That’s not a global tour, we regularly see overseas players decide to quit the game, and those that stay don’t achieve their potential, being constantly away from home.
That was my motivation to implement a different system, which is based on a formula which is used increasingly across the sporting/gaming world. It took me one week, and I have 11000 players on my list. That’s a global system which will encourage people at all levels to come out and play.
But looking for positives from this Saudi event, one would be that the huge prize-money will distort the money list system to breaking point. This would have worked better if someone like Si Jiahui had won it; but with Trump and Williams the current ranking listing looks acceptable enough for the time being.
Other positives are the full 144-player participation at the main venue, and the high quality of the venue and its facilities. I will be in Brentwood next week, which will be very different… The events held in Saudi and China (and to an extent Germany) put the UK venues to shame, especially the Crucible. Perhaps the Saudis will show the way. I’d also mention the facilities for youth snooker that they have opened.
But the very low crowd numbers for most of the event should surely mean that it’s far too soon to think of the World Championship moving there. Perhaps after the 10-year deal comes up for renewal, but certainly not in 2028. Around 2030 we’ll get an idea how the local support is increasing, and whether the young players have maintained their interest.
C’MON MARK J WILLIAMS!!!!
Go Mark , go!!!!