This is where snooker bloggers look back and type about the best and the worst moments of 2018. Some of us lot who seem to have time on our hands also look forward to what we should expect in 2019. I personally can’t wait for 2019 as let’s be honest, 2018 hasn’t been a great year for all of us.
In 2018, we had a lot of highs, which include record-breaking Ronnie O’Sullivan; butt-naked Mark Williams; and Triple Crown-winning Mark Allen. On the other hand, we had a few rotten eggs, such as match-fixing Chinamen, the horrible abuse towards snooker players on social media; and the arguments over the Paul Hunter Classic. It’s been an eventful year.
Knowing the stories of snooker past, we have a number of questions to ponder over. Some we have yet to consider over the horizon but there are some that I hope to know the answer of because of what happened this year. They may be completely useless questions, but there are interesting enough in my head. Just go along with it, alright?
5. Are we ready to embrace the Snooker Shoot-Out as a ranking event?
It’s amazing how time flies so quickly as we approach Snooker Shoot-Out’s third year as a ranking event. It now seems to be a tradition in early February when purists and traditional snooker fans grumble over its status. However loud they may be, Barry Hearn will not badge. Certainly not now.
But it was first introduced as a ranking event, there was uproar. Why on earth should a tournament, where you need to win only seven frames to lift the trophy, be a ranking event? However, over the past couple of years, past critics Peter Ebdon and Joe Perry participated in the event last year, despite lambasting Barry’s decision. I wrote a number of articles on this, so here is my latest article on my opinion on the Snooker Shoot-Out here.
Last year, it provided the magic of a ranking event. Michael Georgiou became the first Cypriot to win his first title, beating Luca Brecel, Martin O’Donnell, and finally Graeme Dott in the final. Also, TV ratings. The blue-ball decider is genius. It gets the younger generation in! On the other hand, many still refuse to accept the event. Those who get relegated from the tour would feel hard done by after being pushed done by a winner who gained 32,000 ranking points for a seven-frame event. I loved the event last year because it was really exciting but is this making a mockery of the sport?
Maybe because it is its third year, fans may be more accepting. If they make critical mistakes like when the referee failed to penalise Xiao Guodong for a time penalty two years ago, people will criticise. Something to ponder…..
4. How will the Trump/Wilson rivalry pan out?
Snooker is desperate for rivalries. Steve Davis vs. Dennis Taylor. Stephen Hendry vs. Ronnie O’Sullivan. Alex Higgins vs. virtually everyone else. So when Judd Trump and Kyren Wilson start throwing verbal blows at each other, World Snooker was only too happy to announce that a new rivalry is born. Between tow young, successful winners to take the game by storm – what could be better?
It escalated so quickly that it feels forced, to be honest. Thankfully, we do have a mouth-watering tie next month at the Dafabet Masters. This pair will face each in the first round and its a tie that everyone wanted. Especially Judd and Kyren. You know they will throw the kitchen sink at each other. Question is whether the rivalry will become greater than now?
Will it become more heated, competitive and personal? Will one of them eventually cause a truce? We will be more clear on this once they face each other next month. This will be tasty!
3. What will the Tour Championship be like?
This is a mystery one. Its name is relatively ambiguous too, since there are more tournaments with similar sounding names. The Players Championship, the International Championship, the China Championship….
Anyway, this one should keep the purists and Ronnie O’Sullivan happy. The top eight players qualify via the one-year ranking list. First round is BO17 frames, followed by second round, which is the BO19. Finally, the final will be a BO25 match, which means the winner will need 13 frames to clasp their hands on the trophy to be the inaugural champion!
This has the event a lot of people were crying out for. Exclusive event – check. Best in-form players – check. Long matches – check. £150,000 – check. Venue Cymru – check. This should be something that provides variety, which is what I’ve been crying out for. Will this live up to the hype? Will this be as good as we expect it to be? I’m personally looking forward to this!
2. What is happening to Jamie Jones?
If you were living in a cave, you might not have heard that Yu Delu and Cao Yupeng were charged for match-fixing. Yu is banned for 10 years, while Cao is out of the game for 6 years and are both thrown out of the tour. This is the biggest ban since Stephen Lee and brought a fair bit of shame to China. Clearly, this is another breakthrough to erase cheating out of the game.
However, one professional is currently suspended. Yet we don’t know if he will be charged or not and it’s gone slightly quiet. So what is happening to Jamie Jones?
All we know is that Jamie was alleged to be “party to or facilitated the manipulation of the outcome of David John’s match with Graeme Dott” in 2016. Since this is an allegation, we do not know if he is part of match-fixing for not, but none of his matches are under suspicion. He was suspended in October, which means he is missing a lot of events. I hope this will be sorted quickly. This is also the case of David John, who is still suspended since last season and has since dropped off the tour.
I am not going to pretend that I know how betting works and what is match-fixing or not. Therefore, here is a tweet by someone who wrote an article about this, who knows a lot more about this than me. It would be interesting to see what the outcome would be after the Yu/Cao debacle and if that has any influence on it. I would love to see Jamie Jones back on tour as a fantastic player who should’ve achieved more by now, but we can only wait for the judgment.
1. Is the old guard of snooker slipping away?
Most people will say no. Ronnie O’Sullivan’s had a very successful year. Mark Williams won the World Championship. John Higgins scored a maximum a couple of weeks after contemplating retirement at the end of the season. What I mean by the above question is: are more established players dropping out of the tour?
We recently heard John Higgins talk about retirement during the UK Championship. He isn’t the only over-40s player to think about packing it in during this season. Dominic Dale, Peter Ebdon, and Robin Hull talked about moving on to pastures new because of health problems or dissatisfaction to the game. Nigel Bond talked about retirement a couple of years ago. But if he drops off the tour, would he be motivated enough to go through Q School? Probably not.
That also goes for other players who are struggling to stay on tour or are hanging on: Joe Swail, Rod Lawler, Ken Doherty, Alan McManus, Anthony Hamilton. Of course, they may qualify via the one-year ranking and may try to qualify elsewhere. But what is interesting is the number of over-40s that could have their professional status erased, while younger prodigies such as Sunny Akani, Yuan Sijun, and Zhao Xintong are climbing up the ranks. Will we see a completely new tour in a year or two? Will a number of the old guard stay up? We have a number of events this season to figure that out!
