Who will be next to win their first ranking title this season? This season really has now got massive shoes to fill.
Last season brought up so many wonderful and controversial stories: Mark Allen winning the Masters; Ronnie’s sublime performance in the English Open; Stuart Bingham being banned for being a naughty boy; and Mark Williams winning the World Championship. However, one of the BIG stories is how many new players are winning their first ranking event.
Three players achieved this feat. Luca Brecel won the China Championship and Michael Georgiou won the Snooker Snoot-Out (you can debate whether that counts till the cows come home)! Ryan Day lost the “best player never to win a ranking event” tag to win the Riga Masters and the Gibraltar Open. Wonderful stuff. You would have thought this gives other players a lot of confidence to try and get their first chance of silverware.
So this is what this countdown is about. I would’ve put Cao Yupeng, but he’s been a naughty boy already. So this season has got off to a good start then!
8. Michael Holt
A couple of years ago, I touted Michael Holt as the most likely player to win his first ranking title. This was during the time he beat Neil Robertson 10-6 in the 2016 World Championships. Shortly after that in the new season, he reached his first ranking final in the 2016 Riga Masters, with Neil Robertson gaining his revenge by winning 5-2. He then beat Ronnie O’Sullivan to reach the quarter-finals of the 2016 International Championship. That victory was his third over the Rocket in a row and haven’t played since.
Unfortunately, he hasn’t reached a ranking quarter-final since that tournament. This, as well as losing five first-round matches, is why he dropped from No. 23 to No. 31 in the rankings. Though his temperament had held him back throughout his career, he is a brilliant player with a fantastic long game and a lot of passion. Since the Riga Masters qualifiers start in the next couple of weeks, I hope he gets off to a great start to win a title there.
7. Mark Joyce
To be honest, I’m surprised I put him on this list myself.
Mark Joyce has been wondering around the No.40 – No.50 mark for what feels like a good number of years. In some ways, it’s a shame that fans remember him for being involved in a public spat with Mark Allen in the Northern Ireland Open.
However, he’s had the best season so far. He earned £83,500 in prize money during 2017/2018 and raising six places to No. 42. He reached three quarter-finals, including the UK Championship. His run included beating David Gilbert, Neil Robertson (his best win of his career) and Lyu Haotian before losing in a decider against Ryan Day. If Joyce keeps playing like he did against Neil, he could be in with a chance, especially after such a good season
Maybe Mark Joyce’s mum will like him then? 😉
6. Hossein Vafaei
After entering the Top 64 on his first attempt, a lot was expected of the Iranian snooker player. In the season before last, he made his first quarter-final appearance in the Nothern Ireland Open. In the 2017 China Open, Vafaei beat Judd Trump 5-3 to reach his first ranking semi-final where he lost to Mark Williams. Last season was a bit of an anti-climax for Vafaei who had just one quarter-final to his name. He also failed to reach the World Championships in the final qualifying round for the second time in a row, beaten by Stephen Maguire 10-7.
Despite an ordinary season, Vafaei rose 14 places to No. 45, ahead of Dominic Dale and Matthew Stevens. Vafaei is armed with great positional play as well as a superb safety game and he is one for the future.
6. Gary Wilson
One of my “Ones To Watch” Gary Wilson is a very decent player who took a while to develop since reaching the 2015 China Open final, where he beat Liang Wenbo, Barry Hawkins and Ding Junhui on the way. Wilson lost a bit of form since then but played very well as a debutant in the 2017 World Championships despite being beaten 10-7 by Ronnie O’Sullivan.
In 2017/2018 season Gary best results include a quarter-final appearance in the Paul Hunter Classic and the Welsh Open semis. This shows that he can recover from a bad patch of form and he could be the one to watch in smaller tournaments and the Home Nations events.
5. David Gilbert
David Gilbert, a American radical left-wing organiser, and activist……sorry, wrong one.
‘The Angry Farmer’ has been in the Top 32 since he reached his first and only ranking final in the 2015 International Championship. The scoreline (10-5) was closer than the match suggested according to opponent John Higgins. Higgins said he hoped to see Gilbert is more ranking finals. Since then, however, Gilbert reached four quarter-finals. A slight run of first-round defeats made him slip into No. 27 in the world.
At 37 years-old, he would be encouraged to see that players around his age bracket or older (Selby, Williams, Higgins, Day) are winning titles. He clearly has the all-round game to do it and is a fantastic potter. But is he being pushed aside by younger players already?
4. Zhou Yuelong
I mentioned Zhou Yuelong in my “Ones To Watch” article because I excited to see his response after dropping out of the Top 32. He had a few surprise losses to players ranked far below him such as Chen Zifan, Peter Lines, Daniel Wells and Robin Hull and He’s 20 years old but is still very highly rated. Neil Robertson touted him as a future ranking-event winner after he beat Zhou in the 2018 China Open. At least he is human, after all as he may have struggled under pressure.
Last season was probably his worst season and even then he won 58% of matches. Many great players such as O’Sullivan, Higgins, Ding, and Trump won ranking titles in their early twenties and younger. Zhou needs to win his first if he wants to be among them, especially so he can beat Yan to it.
3. Xiao Guodong
It feels like a very long time ago when Xiao reached the Shanghai Masters final back in 2013. Since then, his form plummeted from a career-high No. 19 in the world in 2015 to finishing No. 51 at the end of the 2015/2016 season. However, his performances in the past couple of years elevated him to No. 25 at the end of last season.
I feel he’s regaining the form he had back in 2013 when his reached his first ranking semi-final and final. He has a decent record in the Shoot-Out too, having reached the final twice in the past four years. He also reached the quarter-final three times last season and in the Scottish Open, he was beaten by eventual winner Neil Robertson who was on phenomenal form. At 29 years of age, you could say he’s the right age to be at the peak of his form. Will he overtake Yan Bingtao and Liang Wenbo in the ranking table though?
2. Jack Lisowski
You could argue that last season was the first time we saw Jack Lisowski’s potential! Last season alone, he rose 28 places to No. 26 in the world. He reached two ranking quarter-finals and his first ranking semi-final in the 2017 Shanghai Masters when he was defeated 6-3 by Judd Trump. He also qualified for the World Championships and made a much better account of himself compared to his first appearance in 2013. His 10-7 win against Stuart Bingham showed how much he progressed since 2013 in terms of break-building and coping under pressure.
Last season was the best in Jack’s career. But we all know he won’t be happy just to sit back this season. There will be more pressure and he would definitely want to make his first ranking final and to win his first title. Thanks to his ranking he will be against Top 16 in the later stages and it is up to him to make that count.
1. Yan Bingtao
Of course, it had to be him.
Which of these #snooker players do you think will be first to win their first ever ranking title? 🤔 #147sf
— Cluster of Reds (@clusterofreds1) June 19, 2018
He reached the Last 16 stage 7 times last season. First ranking semi-final in the International Championship, beating Ronnie O’Sullivan and John Higgins on the way. First ranking final in the Northern Ireland Open, beaten 9-8 in the decider by Mark Williams, despite leading 6-3 at the end of the session. He’s No. 23 and therefore the highest-ranked player to not win a ranking title. And he is 18 years of age. WHAT.
Clearly, it’s not the matter of IF, it is the matter of WHEN he will win his next title. He can only do what he’s currently doing. What’s amazing is that out of the 16 times he lost a match last season (excluding walkovers), only three were against players currently ranked below him. The fact that he lost three times to Mark Williams and Mark Allen each last season shows that he’s not quite there against the big boys yet. That isn’t a bad problem to have if you think about it! It will be interesting to see whether the pressure of higher expectations will affect his play and it is something we are all excited about seeing!
