That is the question we all like to ponder.
It has been a while since there was a tournament held on the island next door to Britain, but it is refreshing to see snooker finally coming back to Belfast. The city is most famous in the snooker world for being the birthplace of the ‘People’s Champion’ Alex ‘Hurricane’ Higgins. He was a man who smoked like a chimney, drank like Johnny Vegas on a good day, gambled like a beast, yet classy and flamboyant on the green baize with his unusual style of play. It was enough to see him win 23 titles, including two World Champion titles and a member of a very exclusive club of one in ten players to have completed the ‘Triple Crown.’ Since then, there have been many famous Irish and Northern Irish folk, including the plucky, lovely and golf-repeater Dennis Taylor and THAT black in 1985, Ken Doherty in THAT World Championship win in 1997 and is followed by current pros multi-ranking-title winner Allen, Masters-finalist Fergal O’Brien, World Champion semi-finalist Joe “The Outlaw’ Swail, Gerard Greene and first-season pro, Josh Boileau.Perhaps it wouldn’t be a good idea to delve too much into the damning events of Leo Fernandez.
We know how much Mark wants to win a ranking title on his own turf, an event he had been promoting earlier this year. So you can imagine how disgruntled and aghast he was when he is drawn against his bogey player Mark Joyce. Allen has a 4-1 losing record against this fellow and not entirely sure why, but one could imagine there is some history between them! There are some wildcard warriors in former Northern Irish pros Patrick Wallace and Jordan Brown, who are against Michael Georgiou and Ben Woollaston respectively.
This leads us to the rest of the draw, with a number of big names in Mark Selby, Neil Robertson, Jamie Burnett (ahem!) sitting out of this event, including recent withdrawals from Trump and Carter, giving Peter Ebdon and sole Pakistani Hamza Akbar much-needed points. However, other titans such as Ding Junhui (vs. Yu Delu), John Higgins (vs. Paul Davison) and Shaun Murphy (vs. Luca Brecel) are attending. O’Sullivan will be playing against David John, despite insulting the format as well as half of the tour in his interview after beating Mark Allen in the Champion of Champions and, knowing how many twists and turns there were in the English Open a few weeks ago due to the Grand-Slam-Tennis format draw, this should also be interesting. Lastly, Liang Wenbo will be looking to keep the Home Nations-run and the £1,000,000 prize going by facing Nigel Bond in the first round.
Now, for the brief preview and prediction for the first round:
Judd Trump (w/o) vs. Peter Ebdon
Michael Wild vs. Adam Duffy
Kurt Dunham vs. Christopher Keogan
Robert Milkins vs. Scott Donaldson
Stephen Maguire vs. Alan McManus
Wang Yuchen vs. Sanderson Lam
Zak Surety vs. Darryl Hill
Houssain Vafaei vs. Rod Lawler
Zhang Yong vs. Kurt Maflin
Alex Borg vs. Dechawat Poomjaeng
Mike Dunn vs. Josh Boileau
Ali Carter (w/o) vs. Hamza Akbar
Fergal O’Brien vs. Tian Pengfei
Thor Chuang Leong vs. Mitchell Mann
Mark King vs. Igor Figueiredo
Liang Wenbo vs. Nigel Bond
Ronnie O’Sullivan vs. David John
Gareth Allen vs. Jimmy White
Zhang Anda vs. Ian Preece
Chris Wakelin vs. James Wattana
Kyren Wilson vs. Hammad Miah
Jordon Brown vs. Ben Woollaston
Cao Yupeng vs. Akani Songsermawad
Mark Davis vs. James Weston
Matt Selt vs. Jamie Curtis-Barrett
Zhao Xintong vs. David Gilbert
Craig Steadman vs. Alfie Burden
Mark Williams vs. David Grace
Zhou Yuelong vs. Matthew Stevens
Allan Taylor vs. Li Hang
Sam Craigie vs. Jamie Jones
John Higgins vs. Paul Davison
Shaun Murphy vs. Luca Brecel
Adam Stefanow vs. Jamie Cope
Graeme Dott vs. Michael White
Chen Zhe vs. Ross Muir
Ricky Walden vs. Sean O’Sullivan
Kritsanut Lertsattayathorn vs. Rory McLeod
Tom Ford vs. Ian Burns
Dominic Dale vs. Joe Swail
Mei Xiwen vs. Duane Jones
Fraser Patrick vs. Marc Davis
Stuart Carrington vs. Michael Holt
Barry Hawkins vs. Martin O’Donnell
Jack Lisowski vs. David Lilley
John Astley vs. Xiao Guodong
Elliot Slessor vs. Jimmy Robertson
Joe Perry vs. Itaro Santos
Mark Allen vs. Mark Joyce
Michael Georgiou vs. Patrick Wallace
Robin Hull vs. James Cahill
Lee Walker vs. Rhys Clark
Marco Fu vs. Ryan Day
Noppon Saengkam vs. Sam Baird
Andrew Higginson vs. Daniel Wells
Gary Wilson vs. Peter Lines
Ashley Hugill vs. Ken Doherty
Anthony Hamilton vs. Boonyarit Keakikunn.
Aditya Mehta vs. Sydney Wilson
Anthony McGill vs. Fang Xiongman
Eden Sharav vs. Oliver Lines
Steven Hallworth vs. Yan Bingtao
Robbie Williams vs. Thepchaiya Un-Nooh
Ding Junhui vs. Yu Delu
Too early to say who will win, this is for later down the line – enjoy! Now, for Planet Earth 2….
