Month: September 2025

Chris Wakelin is the 2025 Pink Ribbon Champion

Monique Amateur, Charity, Professional snooker tournament, Snooker ,

As you probably know the Pink Ribbon is a pro–am snooker tournament that was initially held at the South West Snooker Academy, later renamed the Capital Venue in Gloucester, England.

The first edition was held in 2010. The tournament raises funds for breast cancer charities and has the players all wear pink shirts to show their support. It was created by Paul Mount who had lost his beloved sister, Kay Suzanne to the disease. It was played at the SWSA for ten years. I went to it every year from 2011 to 2019, taking pictures, a lot of them must still be around somewhere on Facebook, and of course on this blog from 2015 until 2018. Ronnie won it in 2015, the only year he participated. It was revived last season and is now played at the Landywood Snooker Club.

It all started last Friday with the “Flyer Event“, won by Riley Powell who beat Peter Devlin in the final.

The “Top Half” amateur event was played on Saturday. Actually this was the “top half” of the main event, up to and included the “last 64” round as the professionals were seeded in the last 32 of the “main event”.

Similarly, the “Bottom Half” amateur event was played on Monday.

Amateurs entering the Pink Ribbon are granted two bites of the cherry if they so wish. Indeed they have the possibility to play in both halves. 117 amateurs entered the amateur events!

The “main event”, the professional round, was played yesterday. Not all pros won their opening match … some amateurs showed how strong they are! Indeed one of them, Craig Steadman reached the final!

But, eventually, it was a professional, Chris Wakelin who won the event, beating Craig Steadman by 5-3.

Congratulations Chris Wakelin!

Quite a number of matches, including the final, are available on YouTube

Ronnie is “2025 August Player of the Month”

Monique Professional snooker, Tour News ,

This was shared by WPBSA

Ronnie O’Sullivan Named Player of the Month for August

Ronnie O’Sullivan has been voted as the WPBSA Players’ Player of the Month for August after his performance in the 2025 Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters.

Considered the ‘greatest of all time’ by most of his peers, O’Sullivan created history in Jeddah by making two maximum breaks in his semi-final match before losing out in a decider against Neil Robertson in the final.

The historic double-maximum came in his 6-3 victory over Chris Wakelin in the last four, where he also made total clearances of 142 and 134.

It was a close call with O’Sullivan securing 40% of the vote compared to 36% for Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters champion Robertson.

‘The Rocket’ succeeds the previous award winners Marco Fu and Stephen Maguire, who claimed the award in June and July respectively.

O’Sullivan said, “Thank you to all who voted for me because, as players, we all know how much we give to the game.”

Ken Doherty, WPBSA Players Chairman said: “Congratulations to Ronnie, who never ceases to amaze with his performances. What he did in Jeddah was simply incredible and he continues to raise the bar for the rest of us. It was a particularly difficult month to win the award with Neil, Kyren and Guodong all winning ranking events, so it shows how highly the players think of Ronnie’s performance in the semi-final against Chris.”

About the Award

Launched by WPBSA Players, the Players’ Player of the Month award recognises outstanding performance, as voted by fellow players. Its key aim is to honour excellence, consistency, and impact on the table, as recognised by those who understand the demands of the game best.

Each month throughout the 2025/26 season a shortlist will be compiled by an independent panel. The panel includes renowned snooker broadcasters David Hendon and Abigail Davies, sports journalist Phil Haigh and WPBSA Players Director Tian Pengfei. The shortlist will consider performances in all completed events for the corresponding month…

WPBSA Players’ Player of the Month Winners 2025/26

  • June – Marco Fu
  • July – Stephen Maguire
  • August – Ronnie O’Sullivan

It’s a good thing that WPBSA, through this award, recognises that it’s not “all about winning” in sport. Of course, as a sports person your goal is to win, that’s what you are out there to strive for. But the fans, the people who bought a ticket, who made the effort to actually come to the venue, to support their sport and its exponents in person rather than from the comfort of their living room, those people deserve to be entertained, they deserve to be offered something exciting, something exceptional that will stay in their memories forever. That’s why “entertainers” are important in sports and I’m glad that WPBSA recognises that importance.

Igor Figuereido shines in Sacramento

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Igor Figuereido dominated the 2025 Pan American Championships, winning both the Open Snooker Championship and the Seniors Championship.

Here is the report shared by WPBSA

Igor Figueriedo Does the Double at 2025 Pan American Snooker Championships

Igor Figueiredo defeated Fabio Anderson Luerson 5-2 to win the 2025 Pan American Open Snooker Championship and earn a two-year World Snooker Tour (WST) tour card.

The continental success means the Brazilian will be nominated for a fourth spell among the professional ranks having first joined the  Tour in 2010.

Figueiredo was the dominant force at the Aryan Snooker Club in Sacramento, California as he won both the Open and Seniors Championship titles to earn a two-year WST tour card and qualification for the 2026 World Seniors Snooker Championship – a title he won at the iconic Crucible Theatre last year.

The 47-year-old began the event, which is organised by the Pan American Billiards & Snooker Association (PABSA), with a clean sweep of whitewash victories over fellow countryman Ricardo Bouwman Filho and American cueists Sam McGrath and Pravin Patel.

He dropped just two further frames en route to the semi-finals as he overcame Saif Ibrahim (3-0), Zia Sheik (4-1) and Jason Williams (4-1).

It was an impressive week for Brazilian snooker as the semi-final line-ups for both the Seniors and Open Championships featured all four players from the South American nation.

Three of these – Figueiredo, Luersen and Nelson Rodrigues Morreira – competed in the semi-finals of both events while they were joined by former WST professional Victor Sarkis in the Open competition.

It was Sarkis that faced Figueiredo in the last four but it was the senior man that was in dominant form as he completed yet another whitewash win to move within one victory of the title.

Luersen was his opponent in the title match after he completed a 4-2 defeat of Morreira as he looked to add to the Pan American Seniors Snooker Championship title that he had won 12 months ago.

Figueiredo proved to be too strong once again, however, as he rounded off an unforgettable week by completing a 5-2 victory to secure the title and a WST tour card.

Congratulations Igor Figueiredo!

As always, all the detailed results can be found on snooker.org

Wether Igor will actually take his tour card remains to be seen though. He didn’t “finish” his last spell on tour and went back to Brazil before his tour card “expired”, explaining that this life abroad was too hard for him and his family. This is understandable. Brazil is too far away for making it possible for Brazilian players to return home just to spend a week-end or indeed any short period of time with their loved ones. The trip is costly and very tiring because the huge time difference. He might however decide to play in the World and Seniors World Championships, as these are “one-offs” in the season and, of course, very special.

I really do hope that he will be able to play in a few events though as he’s very entertaining and (almost) always smiling.

…

2025 Northern Ireland Open – Qualifiers Day 4

Monique Professional snooker, Professional snooker tournament

The qualifying rounds for the 2025 Northern Ireland Open concluded yesterday and here is the report shared by WST:

Brecel Notches First Win

Luca Brecel registered his first win of the season by beating Liam Davies 4-0 to qualify for the final stages of the BetVictor Northern Ireland Open.

…

After skipping the first few ranking events of the campaign, Brecel made his return at the Xi’an Grand Prix qualifiers but conceded his tie with Sunny Akani when 2-0 behind. This time the 2023 World Champion stuck to the task and completed a whitewash over Davies with top breaks of 79 and 52. Brecel, who lies 41st in the Johnstone’s Paint World Rankings, will head to the Waterfront Hall in Belfast next month for the televised stages.

Steven Hallworth, who enjoyed a career-high payday at the recent Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters by reaching the last 32, scored another impressive win with a 4-3 defeat of Matthew Stevens. From 3-2 down, Hallworth fired breaks of 136 and 64 in the last two frames.

Two-time ranking event winner Anthony McGill could be in danger of relegation later in the season so a 4-1 win over Alexander Ursenbacher, with a top run of 88, was a much-needed boost. Robert Milkins also needs positive results to keep his tour card and he saw off Patrick Whelan 4-2. Ben Woollaston closed with a 109 in a 4-0 win over Mateusz Baranowski.

Liam Pullen made a career-high break of 143 but still lost 4-2 to Long Zehuang.

All the detailed results can be found on snooker.org, as usual.

It seems that yesterday the WST “redactor” stayed put until most of the games finished.

Among the results not mentioned here above is the 4-3 win by Ashley Hugill, who played in this as an amateur, over Ricky Walden. Ricky once was a top 16 player but recurring back injuries/pain destroyed his career. This saddens me. When on form Ricky is a beautiful player to watch and someone who loves his sport deeply. Also, he absolutely hates losing … you better leave him alone for a couple of hours after a defeat 🙄 😉.

The Hallworth v Stevens match was a good one to watch, and I’m pleased with the result too. Steven Hallworth does a great job for Eurosport/TNT and I believe that it helps him. He’s not relying solely on his results at the table to make a living, and, after a defeat, working in the studio probably helps him moving on and not dwelling on the lost match.

2025 Northern Ireland Open – Qualifiers Day 3

Monique Snooker

Here is the report shared by WST

Un-Nooh Through To Belfast

Thepchaiya Un-Nooh edged out Julien Leclercq 4-3 to qualify for the final stages of the BetVictor Northern Ireland Open and will head to the Waterfront Hall in Belfast next month. 

…

Thailand’s Un-Nooh is enjoying a strong start to the season, notably reaching the last 16 of the Wuhan Open, and a narrow victory over Leclercq puts him into the last 64 of another ranking event. A break of 85 helped give Un-Nooh a 3-1 lead, then Belgium’s Leclercq fought back to 3-3 and led 59-0 in the decider. But Un-Nooh made a vital break of 71 to lead by 12 points and later potted the pink for victory.

Stan Moody top scored with 80 in a 4-0 win over Reanne Evans while Dylan Emery’s top break of 89 helped him to beat Xu Si 4-3. 

China’s 17-year-old Lan Yuhao beat Michael Holt 4-2 with runs of 115, 53, 80 and 50. Scott Donaldson top scored with 127 in a 4-2 defeat of Antoni Kowalski.

The qualifiers conclude on Sunday then the main event runs from October 19-26.

For once the main theme of the report is not a match involving at least one British/Irish player… it’s about a match between a Thai and a Belgian. Hallelujah! It was a good match to watch. Of course I wanted Julien to go through but I like them both and I’m not too disappointed. Julien fought really well and Theppy’s near clearance1 to win was a very good one, it wasn’t straightforward.

As usual, you will find all the detailed results on snooker.org.

Another interesting result is Haris Tahir 4-3 win over Lyu Haotian. It was another hard fought, close match and Haris prevailed over a far more “tour experienced” player. Remarkably, Haris has now qualified for the coming 2025 British Open and 2025 Northern Ireland Open, and still has the 2025 English Open and 2025 Xi’an Grand Prix coming. His first match in the latter is “held-over”, he is due to face Kyren Wilson, obviously a difficult opponent. In Brentwood though he will play young Michal Szubarczyk, a very promising prospect but still very young and inexperienced.

Big question marks today … Luca Brecel is due to play Liam Davies later afternoon today. Will he play? If he does, what about the cue or cues? Will he finish the match? Young Liam needs to be ready for anything and everything 🙄

  1. minus the final black ↩︎

2025 Northern Ireland Open – Qualifiers Day 2

Monique Professional snooker tournament, Snooker ,

Here is the report by WST on day 2 at the 2025 NI Open qualifiers:

Quinn Wins Derby To Boost Belfast Hopes

Coalisland’s Fergal Quinn edged out Antrim’s Robbie McGuigan 4-3 in the first qualifying round of the BetVictor Northern Ireland Open, needing one more win to earn a place in the final stages in Belfast. 

…

Quinn, playing his debut season on the pro tour, will meet Zak Surety on Sunday with the winner to go through to the Waterfront Hall next month. McGuigan came from 2-0 down to lead 3-2, but Quinn took frame six with runs of 47 and 53 then got the better of a low-scoring decider.

Jimmy White reached the last 32 of this event last year but he misses out this time, losing 4-2 to China’s Huang Jiahao whose top break was 97.

Fight-back of the day came from Poland’s Mateusz Baranowski who recovered a 3-0 deficit to beat Wang Yuchen 4-3, making a 62 in the decider. Liam Pullen, who beat John Higgins in the Xi’an Grand Prix qualifiers earlier in the week, built on his momentum with a 4-0 defeat of Ben Mertens, firing breaks of 89, 96 and 100.

As usual, all the results are available on snooker.org.

As usual as well – alas – the report is far from exhaustive and focuses mainly on the UK and Irish players results. Also, not a single match of the evening session is reported on. And, alas again, I can’t add too much to it.

I watched two matches, the Baranowski v Wang one and the Pullen v Mertens one. Both ended with defeat for player I supported1. Liam Pullen played extremely well, no complaints. The Baranowski v Wang match was a typical “qualifiers match”. It was hard fought, not very fluent at all, with only one breaks over 50, one each, a 63 by Wang.

  1. Although I have absolutely nothing against their opponents ↩︎

2025 Northern Ireland Open – Qualifiers Day 1 … and Other News

Monique Snooker

There are two rounds of qualifying matches for the 2025 Northern Ireland Open and, yesterday was the first day of the first round. Hereafter you will find the short report shared by WST:

Pengcheng Floors Ken

China’s Yao Pengcheng continue to show promise in his debut pro season as he beat Ken Doherty 4-1 in the first qualifying round of the BetVictor Northern Ireland Open.

…

Earlier this week, 28-year-old Yao beat Zak Surety 5-1 to qualify for the Xi’an Grand Prix, and he notched another notable scalp with a comfortable win over former Crucible king Doherty. He will meet Oliver Lines on Saturday with the winner to go through to the final stages in Belfast next month. 

Marco Fu opened with breaks of 104 and 114 and went on to beat Amir Sarkhosh 4-2. Liam Graham top scored with 96 in a 4-0 defeat of Chris Totten while Farakh Ajaib potted brown, blue and pink in the deciding frame to edge out Oliver Brown 4-3.

Julien Leclercq top scored with 99 in a 4-2 defeat of Florian Nuessle, while Ian Burns made a 130 during a 4-0 win over Haydon Pinhey. 

As always, all the results are available on snooker.org

I’m very pleased for Julien who really needed a good result as he appeared to struggle recently, but I would have preferred if it came against someone other than Florian. Another young player from mainland Europe also registered a win: Antoni Kowalski beat Zak Sheldon, an amateur from Northern Ireland. I had never heard of Zak before, I know next to nothing about him1 and, to be honest, he didn’t impress me at all. That said, he’s probably not used to professional conditions and the environment was hardly inspiring.

Intrigued by Lewis’ comment, I watched the match between Sunny Akani and Xu Yi Chen. It was good fun and I’m happy for Sunny who won it. Xu can pot for sure but, yeah, he’s peculiar.

In other news … 2025 English Open Draw

WST has published the draw for the 2025 English Open

Robertson To Defend English Title In Strong Brentwood Field

Neil Robertson will defend his BetVictor English Open title in the world ranking event which runs from September 11-21 at the Brentwood Centre in Essex, with the draw and format now available.

Click here for the draw and match schedule

The field is packed with snooker’s star names including world number one Judd Trump, World Champion Zhao Xintong, Kyren Wilson, Mark Williams, Shaun Murphy, Mark Selby, Wuhan Open champion Xiao Guodong, Mark Allen, local Essex players Ali Carter and Stuart Bingham, and many more. 

…

The first two rounds run from Thursday September 11th to Sunday September 14th, then the top 32 seeds enter the action from Monday September 15th. The showpiece final will be on Sunday September 21st.

Australia’s Robertson lifted the Steve Davis Trophy last year after beating Wu Yize 9-7 in a dramatic final and he’ll start the defence of his title against either Sunny Akani, Oliver Brown on David Lilley. Matches involving the all-time greats in round three include:

Monday September 15

1pm
Kyren Wilson v opponent

Not before 2pm
Mark Selby v opponent

7pm
Mark Williams v opponent

Not before 8pm
Shaun Murphy v opponent

Tuesday September 16

1pm
Judd Trump v opponent

Not before 2pm
Mark Allen v opponent

7pm
Neil Robertson v opponent

Not before 8pm
Zhao Xintong v opponent

This is the first of the 2025/26 BetVictor Home Nations Series, with a bonus of £150,000 up for grabs for the players who performs best across the four events in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Robertson banked that bonus last season, with Trump, John Higgins and Robert Milkins winning it in previous years.

No Ronnie in the draw, which didn’t surprise me. He never liked these “packed” events played in Leisure centres and the Final in Saudi Arabia somehow has already “secured” his season even if he has a lot of points to defend.

  1. I just looked up his results on Cuetracker ↩︎