Since we finished the Paul Hunter Classic and we won’t have a ranking event for another month, why not some reading to keep things ticking? Yes, I know the 6Reds and the Shanghai Masters are coming up!

Mark Williams mentioned this to World Snooker during the World Open this year:

“All the players know that the best player in the world is Ronnie O’Sullivan, and the only reason he isn’t number one is that he doesn’t play in a lot of tournaments. It makes virtually no difference now what your ranking is, because in most tournaments everyone starts in the same round. To be world number one might sound nice but it means nothing now.” World Snooker

So what do we think? Are rankings becoming less significant over the past few years? Does being No. 1 feel like an achievement than it did previously?

The ranking system

It is one of the few unfortunate consequences of the new ranking system since the 2014/2015 season. Rather than being awarded points according to tariffs preset by the governing body as in previous seasons, the players are ranked by their prize money earnings in ranking tournaments. With so many events around, this meant that players can either pick and choose or decide to play on all of them anyway.

There are many positives and negatives about this ranking system. But the most relevant limitation here is that the number of points that the winner obtains is slightly blown out of proportion. This distorts the table slightly. Examples include Liang Wenbo and Anthony Hamilton, who could face a rapid drop down the table when they lose their points from winning the English Open and German Masters two years ago. David Grace managed to stay on tour because of his semi-final run in the 2015 UK Championship and dropped off tour when those points were erased and was unable to replace them in time.

I did an article on whether the current ranking system is actually fair, in reaction to Neil Robertson’s outburst that the prize-money list is stupid. Please read here: https://clusterofreds.com/2017/10/24/featured-is-the-current-points-system-fair/

Does being world No. 1 matter?

This plays into the hands of Ronnie O’Sullivan. Ronnie will never play in every event in a season again. He doesn’t need to. All he needs to do is win a couple of high-profile events and his position in the Top 16 is intact. That way he can afford to miss out on a few tourneys and concentrate on family life and other commitments. The Rocket is clearly the most talented and naturally gifted player at the moment but he is currently No. 3 in the rankings. The table doesn’t just reward talent – it rewards commitment and consistency. That is what got Mark Selby and Judd Trump to the No. 1 spot in the first place.

It wouldn’t surprise me if most snooker players would take a ranking trophy over being No. 1 in the world any day. Perhaps being No. 1 is only significant when you’ve held that spot for a while. Stephen Hendry was known to be No. 1 for eight consecutive seasons and Mark Selby has been No. 1 for more than three years. When Ding Junhui became the 11th world number one since the rankings started in 1976,

Barry Hearn says:

“It’s a great achievement. The fact is, he’s not world number one by luck, he has got there on performance.” BBC Sport

Problem is, Ding was No. 1 for a total of one month. Judd was No. 1 for a total of two months. Not many people would remember them of that fact – as it stands they well remember them as among the best players never to win the World Championship.

Does any ranking matter?

It does seem that there are fewer and fewer incentives to being in the Top 16. To those between No.17-32, it certainly feels that there are no incentives at all. I wrote an article or two in this so without the sake of being repetitive, I’ll be brief.

Because nearly every tournament starts with 128 players in Round One, you can understand why those players would feel aggrieved. They spent years working their way to the top and avoiding the the number of qualifying matches only to be pegged back to the first round again. Their protection is gone. Every event except the World Championship is like this. Though some draws are seeded in some way (e.g. German Masters Top 32; Home Nations events Top 16), it doesn’t feel much of an advantage. For example, in the 2017 English Open, 12th seed Luca Brecel drew 17th seed Ryan Day in the first round. What the heck?

The time where rankings mean everything are when you are fighting to stay on the tour. If you finish as No. 64 in the world, you are staying for another season. If you finish as No. 65 in the world, then you can only be saved if you did well enough on the one-year ranking list.

World Championships

Speaking of the World Championships, the Top 16 automatically qualify for the Crucible and The Masters. No qualms about that. It’s the qualifying to the Crucible that caused some debate. Previously, your ranking determines how many matches you play (e.g. No.17-32 play just one match to qualify, and so on). Since 2015, Barry Hearn threw that out of the window and made sure everyone ranked No. 17 and below play three rounds of best-of-19 matches to qualify. On one hand it is exciting for the fan, brutal and increases the prestige of the World Championship at the Crucible by how much work you need to do to get there.

On the other hand, you can win three events in a season, but because you just missed out of the Top 16, you are treated the same as someone who hadn’t won a match all season. That’s what happened last year to then No. 17 seed Ryan Day, awaiting the lottery of being against a seasoned professional or an inexperienced amateur. For more in-depth analysis, click here: https://clusterofreds.com/2018/04/15/featured-is-the-world-championship-qualifying-system-actually-fair/

Ending