Snooker: O'Sullivan overcomes the Melbourne Machine

This was a great match. In the first session O'Sullivan went 6-2 up with some great snooker. In the second session, O'Sullivan couldn't quite find his form and Neil Robertson won it 6-2 to take the match to 8-8 going into the final session. In the last frame of the second session, Robertson knocked in a majestic 140 to leap to the top of the high break board.

At 10-9 Robertson looked in control but Ronnie came back at him to make it 10-10. In the 21st frame Robertson needed a relatively easy pink with the rest to make it 11-10, but the pressure seemed get to him and he missed. Ronnie finally took the frame on the black.

Ronnie stepped up a gear for the remainder of the match and won 13-10. This was sweet revenge for Ronnie as Robertson has beaten him twice this season.

Ronnie now plays Higgins in the quarter finals which should be the pick of the quarters.

But the whole line up looks great with Maguire vs Hamilton, Ronnie vs Higgins, Stevens vs Murphy and Selby vs Carter.

Snooker: Selby defeats Grinder Ebdon

Mark Selby played brilliantly well to dispose of former world champion Peter Ebdon by 13 frames to 8.

During the match Selby knocked in 5 centuries, 3 of those in succession, the other 2 back to back. This has to be the best win of Selby's professional career and it will be his first appearance in the World Championship quarter finals.

He will play Ali Carter in the next round who beat a well out of form Stephen Hendry 13-6. That said, Carter played really well. Hendry said, "Every time I went to the table, the white was somewhere where I didn't want it."

Snooker: WSA Blames Global Warming!

Well, ...I've heard it all now. All the players are complaining about the table conditions, how the balls are "pinging" or speeding up of the cushions and also squaring up. Here's one that I never thought I would hear from the World Snooker Association, they're blaming Global Warming!

A WSA statement read, "The temperature inside the Crucible was above what we consider the optimum as a result of unusually warm weather,"

"We've brought the temperature back to optimum and re-clothed the tables."

According to the Met Office, April could be the warmest since records began. It is true that heat can speed up the table by drying the fine cloths quickly but it doesn't really explain the unpredictable cushions.

Isn't the Crucible air conditioned? Air conditioning is great, what you can do is set it to a particular temperature regardless of the temperature outside the venue. So whether the ice caps are melting, your elderly next door neighbour is freezing to death on his way home from the shops, or Miami is getting hit by a category 5 hurricane, a snooker player can feel quite comfortable in his waistcoat and bow tie. If the Crucible isn't air conditioned, then what are they doing there!?

Let's hope the snooker table conditions improve so we can see some great high quality snooker with no excuses from the players.

American Pool: 9-Ball Eurotour Germany

It's that time again and I can feel the excitement already building. When I wake up on the Monday morning of the week of a Eurotour event, I already start to get that same exciting feeling we used to get when we were kids on the night before Christmas. This event is going to be particular fun, as I'm planning to do a few interviews with top players and post them in our blog. It could be interesting to know what Tony Drago thinks of his mum's cooking, for example... or what Raj Hundal keeps hidden under his bandana... or how did Oliver Ortmann end up with such a strange cue action?

It's one of my favorite venues for a Eurotour in a pool club in Sindelfingen. The atmosphere there is always great because unlike a lot of the new Eurotour venues that are hotels, this event is still held in a pool club/bar and all the players hanging out waiting to play and watching are at the bar making for a much more exciting atmosphere.

Who's your money on for this event? Well... as always with 9-ball, it's anyone's guess, but you are usually safe to put a bob or two on the fact that players such as Ortmann, Souquet, Van den Berg, Peach, Chamat, Immonen, Homan and Engert... are all likely to play a part in the later stages.

Defending champion Harold Stolka will have it all to do to hold on to his 630 points from last year and avoid a large fall down the rankings. Ortmann finished 2nd last year so he will also be hoping for a good result to hang on to his top spot on the ranking list. With less than 400 points separating the top 8, it is gonna be exciting to see who the movers and shakers will be this year. Along with Ortmann, Feijen is also defending big points and failure to qualify for the last 32 by either of these two would open things right up.

Only 3 days to go now until it gets underway. Don't forget that the TV table will be shown live on bwin.com throughout the tournament and that the semi finals and final will be televised on Eurosport at a later date.

Snooker: Stevens overcomes valiant Allen

In a great match, Matthew Steven managed to keep his cool to beat Mark Allen by 13 frames to 9. This is a much needed win for Stevens who has been struggling to keep his top 16 place this season.

Mark Allen has had a great début at the Crucible beating Doherty and put up a great fightback against Stevens. Allen was 8-3 down and pulled the match back to 11-9. But he couldn't hang on with the pressure of the match building as the end was in sight.

Stevens now goes on to play Shaun Murphy in the quarter final, a repeat of the 2005 world final. It should prove to be a cracking match!

Snooker: Hamilton vs McCulloch

Anthony Hamilton stepped up a gear in the final session and won the first 5 frames to bet Ian McCulloch by 13 frames to 8. The match was largely a scrappy affair and McCulloch didn't really show what he's capable of.

Hamilton will now face Stephen Maguire in the quarter finals.

Snooker: Parrott Subdued by Murphy

Shaun Murphy played a good solid 5 frames to dispose of John Parrott by 13 frames to 8. John has really shown that the pubic should not be condemning him to the BBC TV studio as a full time job just yet!

Parrott showed great mettle to come back from 4-0 down, then to 7-4 and then finished the second session with a 123 break to level at 8-8. It certainly shows that Parrott isn't scared of modern day former world champions and Murphy wasn't playing particularly badly.

But the 2005 champion showed his class in the final session; punching his fist at his supporters going into the mid-session interval 12-8. During the frame that clinched his victory, the man from Rotheram didn't really blink and wrapped up the match that people thought he would win reasonably easily. Just goes to show that the old fellas can still give the young guns a good game over distance!!

It's great to see Parrott back on the main stage and I think Murphy now looks a serious contender for the championship.

Snooker: Boats and Arms

Now, I don't know if this is only getting to me, ....but it certainly IS getting to me! And what a better place to complain about it than my own blog! :-)

Snooker commentators seem to be confused about certain English sayings and phrases. I think it was John Virgo that started the trend of saying an incorrect English phase or saying when trying to be more elaborate about certain shots that players were playing.

I have to quickly state before I go any further that generally I like the snooker coverage supplied by various channels, and I like Virgo, Taylor, Thorne et al. They do know their stuff as they're all ex-players (although some of them might struggle bending over a snooker table these days) and they can be witty, opinionated, diplomatic etc, depending on which commentator we're talking about.

BUT, it seems that when a player "chances his arm", every commentator has jumped on the Virgo bandwagon and they all now seem to think he's "pushed the boat out". Straight away I have to state here that originally I'm from Yorkshire, so I know exactly what "pushing the boat out" means, as folk from round my way didn't do it very often! :-)

Pushing the boat out is something my old man does when he's at a party, pub, restaurant, or on holiday with people he likes. He gets his wallet out, brushes off the cobwebs, and gets more than his fair share of rounds in at the bar. The next morning he'll check his wallet and say, "Crikey! I pushed the boat out a bit last night!", meaning he spent a little more of his hard earned cash than he really wanted to.

What Virgo et al should be saying when players like Ebdon and Dott go for a pot is, "he chanced his arm there a bit!"

Chancing your arm is something my old man does when he's at the golf club having a quick drink after a 18 holes. His mates will be badgering him for another drink and he knows he's near the drink driving limit. But he's having a good time with his mates, and besides, his best mate Tommy is in the middle of a decent story, ...so he'll go to the bar get another drink, then he'll "chance his arm" and drive home hoping no pigs, ...erm, sorry, policemen will pull him over (If there are any police reading this and getting worried, ...I'm making this story up OK!). It's worth noting that while at the bar, he might have been in the process of pushing the boat out as well.

So come on John, Steve, Dennis, Clive and Willie, get your English phrases right!

Snooker: Selby, Robertson and Hendry Through!

Neil Robertson, Mark Selby and Stephen Hendry are through to the last 16.

The snooker tables seem to be taking more of a headline than the snooker players at the moment. The bounces of the cushions are ridiculous at times and are beginning to make the players look like they've played poor shots. That isn't always the case of course and the tables need to be looked at as soon as possible by the table fitters.

Robertson played well to beat Day who's a great talent and it was always going to be a difficult first round match for both players. Robertson will now play Ronnie in the next round and that one should be the last 16 match to look out for. He's beaten Ronnie twice this season already so look for Ronnie to get some revenge!

I didn't see any of the Hendry match but I've heard through the commentators on the BBC that Hendry struggled to beat newcomer David Gilbert by 10 frames to 7. Hendry said the cushions were a real problem as well.

Hendry is using a new cue, so maybe he's struggling with it a little under tournament conditions. When looking at his action with his previous cue, it almost looked as if it was a little too heavy and that he was trying to force the cue through the cue ball. I haven't seen him playing with his new cue yet. I don't think he's been the same player since his original Riley cue was stolen many years ago. He certainly hasn't had the same amount of success with his recent cues but that could be attributed to many different factors.

The victory of the day has to be Mark Selby who beat Stephen Lee by 10 frames to 7 after been 5-0 down! I heard the BBC presenter say that currently Lee's wife is not too well so Lee isn't practising as much as he needs to. Nevertheless, I think Selby is a great player and it's a great win for him. He's been over to Switzerland and played in the Swiss Open a couple of times and he's always performed reasonably well. It's about time one of my predictions made it through to the next round!

Snooker: 888 World Championships, Last 16 Order of Play

Thursday 26 April

Second round matches (best of 25 frames)

1430 BST
Shaun Murphy (Eng) v John Parrott (Eng)

1900 BST
Anthony Hamilton (Eng) v Ian McCulloch (Eng)

Friday 27 April

1000 BST
Shaun Maguire v Joe Swail (NI)
Shaun Murphy (Eng) v John Parrott (Eng)

1430 BST
Anthony Hamilton (Eng) v Ian McCulloch (Eng)
Matthew Stevens (Wal) v Mark Allen (NI)

1900 BST
Stephen Maguire (Sco) v Joe Swail (NI)
Shaun Murphy (Eng) v John Parrott (Eng)

Saturday 28 April

1000 BST
Anthony Hamilton (Eng) v Ian McCulloch (Eng)
Matthew Stevens (Wal) v Mark Allen (NI)

1430 BST
Stephen Maguire (Sco) v Joe Swail (NI)
Stephen Hendry (Sco) v Ali Carter (Eng)

1900 BST
John Higgins (Sco) v Fergal O'Brien (Ire)
Matthew Stevens (Wal) v Mark Allen (NI)

Snooker: 888 World Championships, Second Round Matches

For me the pick of this round will be Ronnie vs Robertson and Allen vs Stevens.

Ian McCulloch
Anthony Hamilton

Stephen Maguire
Joe Swail

John Higgins
Fergal O'Brien

Neil Robertson
Ronnie O'Sullivan

Mark Allen
Matthew Stevens

John Parrott
Shaun Murphy

Peter Ebdon
Mark Selby

Ali Carter
Stephen Hendry

Snooker: Williams vs Swail

What a fantastic match. Unfortunately another former champion bites the dust but Swail really turned it on under pressure to win a final frame decider 10-9.

Williams looked in command when 8-6 up but missed a couple of long pots to let Joe Swail in. Swail's long potting was excellent and he was banging them in from all over the place. He looked under control right until the end and the first time he lead the match was when he took the final frame.

Williams hasn't really been on form for a couple of seasons and only looked good in spells. His positional play wasn't quite there and he missed some easy balls in and around the black spot.

Overall, Swail deserved the victory, ...just! Great to see another final frame decider at the Crucible.

Swail will now play Maguire in the next round.

Snooker: North vs South

Mark Allen has defeated the ex-world champion Ken Doherty by 10 frames to 7. This must rate as Mark Allen's best professional performance of his young career!

I was talking about newcomers in one of my previous posts, Mark Allen is now the only newcomer to have made it through to the next round. He now goes on to play Matthew Stevens, another very tough match as Stevens tends to play his best snooker at the Crucible, having been runner-up twice.

Unfortunately I was unable to see the final session of the match. If anybody out there saw it and would like to comment, please feel free to do so with the "comments" link below.

Snooker: Jonni Fulcher on YouTube

Check out some funky vids by our other contributor, Jonni Fulcher on YouTube!

Snooker: Murphy comes up Trump(s)!

Shaun Murphy looked in great form today beating the 17 year old débutant Judd Trump by 10 frames to 6.

Murphy started well going 3-0 up and it was 3-1 by the time they got to the mid-session interval. Eventually Trump managed to go one frame ahead at 6 frames to 5 through some great attacking snooker. Unfortunately that was the last frame that Trump won and Murphy won 5 in a row to take the match 10-6.

Trump, along with Mark Allen, have looked the best newcomers to the Crucible this year, with Allen looking especially good going into tomorrows final session leading Ken Doherty by 6 frames to 3. Allen started brilliantly going into the mid-session interval with a 4-0 lead hitting two 90+ breaks in the first 2 frames that could have easily been centuries.

It would be great to see a newcomer go further in the tournament and beating an ex-world champion like Doherty in the first round would be a terrific achievement!!

More news as it happens!

Snooker: Rocket Dents Ding's Chances

We're only in between sessions but the chances of Ding making it through to the second round of the World Championships are now very very slim.

Ronnie was playing well and missed very little in the first session. But I do feel that Ding made Ronnie's life a little easier with his slightly reckless approach.

Ding's composure didn't look to be there yesterday and he seemed to be going for way too many shots. People talk about Ding having a good temperament but I'm not too sure any more. After first bursting onto the scene his temperament looked great, similar to Marco Fu's and James Wattana's, but lately we've seen chinks in the China armour.

When watching the Premier League on Sky Sports last year, we saw Ding completely lose it in one of his matches (I think it was when he played Jimmy White), thrashing balls all over the table and looking completely frustrated. Then we saw him lose his composure in the final of the Masters, Ronnie evidently stopping him from conceding the match a frame or 2 early.

At 8-1 down Ding now only has a very slim chance of getting through, it's tough to see Ronnie losing it from that position, although we all know he's prone to his meltdowns too!! Let's hope Ding can get back into it this afternoon and make a match out of a demolition. My prediction of Ding making it to the final doesn't look too good at the moment either!

Snooker: 888 World Championships, First Round Order of Play

Saturday 21 April

First round matches (best of 19 frames)

1000 BST
Peter Ebdon (Eng) v Nigel Bond (Eng)
Graeme Dott (Sco) v Ian McCulloch (Eng)

1430 BST
Matthew Stevens (Wal) v Joe Delaney (Ire)
Anthony Hamilton (Eng) v Marco Fu (HK)

1900 BST
Graeme Dott (Sco) v Ian McCulloch (Eng)
Steve Davis (Eng) v John Parrott (Eng)

Sunday 22 April

1000 BST
Peter Ebdon (Eng) v Nigel Bond (Eng)
Barry Hawkins (Eng) v Fergal O'Brien (Ire)

1430 BST
Steve Davis (Eng) v John Parrott (Eng)
Ronnie O'Sullivan (Eng) v Ding Junhui (Chn)

1900 BST
Anthony Hamilton (Eng) v Marco Fu (HK)
Matthew Stevens (Wal) v Joe Delaney (Ire)

Monday 23 April

1000 BST
Shaun Murphy (Eng) v Judd Trump (Eng)
Barry Hawkins (Eng) v Fergal O'Brien (Ire)

1430 BST
Ken Doherty (Ire) v Mark Allen (NI)
Ronnie O'Sullivan (Eng) v Ding Junhui (Chn)

1900 BST
Shaun Murphy (Eng) v Judd Trump (Eng)
Stephen Maguire (Sco) v Joe Perry (Eng)

Tuesday 24 April

1000 BST
Ken Doherty (Ire) v Mark Allen (NI)
Mark Williams (Wal) v Joe Swail (NI)

1430 BST
Stephen Maguire (Sco) v Joe Perry (Eng)
Stephen Hendry (Sco) v David Gilbert (Eng)

1900 BST
Mark Williams (Wal) v Joe Swail (NI)
Stephen Lee (Eng) v Mark Selby (Eng)

Wednesday 25 April

1000 BST
Stephen Hendry (Sco) v David Gilbert (Eng)
Neil Robertson (Aus) v Ryan Day (Wal)

1430 BST
John Higgins (Sco) v Michael Holt (Eng)
Stephen Lee (Eng) v Mark Selby (Eng)

1900 BST
Neil Robertson (Aus) v Ryan Day (Wal)
Ali Carter (Eng) v Andy Hicks (Eng)

Thursday 26 April

1430 BST
John Higgins (Sco) v Michael Holt (Eng)

1900 BST
Ali Carter (Eng) v Andy Hicks (Eng)

Snooker: 888 World Championships, First Round Draw

Graeme Dott
Ian McCulloch

Anthony Hamilton
Marco Fu

Stephen Maguire
Joe Perry

Mark Williams
Joe Swail

John Higgins
Michael Holt

Barry Hawkins
Fergal O'Brien

Neil Robertson
Ryan Day

Ronnie O'Sullivan
Ding Junhui

Ken Doherty
Mark Allen

Matthew Stevens
Joe Delaney

Steve Davis
John Parrott

Shaun Murphy
Judd Trump

Peter Ebdon
Nigel Bond

Stephen Lee
Mark Selby

Ali Carter
Andy Hicks

Stephen Hendry
David Gilbert

American Pool: 9-Ball Eurotour

Just thought I'd jot down a little note on what's going on in the world of 9-Ball over in Europe. For those who don't already know, 9-Ball is one of the disciplines of American pool along with 8-Ball and Straight Pool. The Eurotour, which now has seven tournaments per year, has been running since 1992, at which time it was dominated by top names such as Oliver Ortmann and Ralf Souquet, who between them have taken home 26 tournament victories out of a total of 85 tour stops since 1992. Hot on their heals is Thomas Engert with a total of 8 victories.

Back in the early days of European 9-Ball, there weren’t many players who could seriously challenge these guys and between 1992 and 2000 out of the 42 tournaments in the 9 year period, 31 were won by one of only 5 men. I list them here in order of number of victories:

Oliver Ortmann (11), Ralf Souquet (8), Thomas Engert (6), Mika Immonen (3), Tom Storm(3).

The remaining 11 tournaments were won by 11 other individuals.
If you compare these statistics with the statistics from the last 8 years from 2000 to 2007 inclusive you find that out of 43 tournaments, only 11 were won by the players listed above in order again:

Ralf Souquet (5), Oliver Ortmann (2), Thomas Engert (2), Tom Storm(2).

You then have the newer stock appearing such as:

Niels Feijen(3), Nick Van den Berg(3), Marcus Chamat(3), Alex Lely(3), leaving 20 tournaments to be shared out amongst another 19 players with 6 of those winning two events each.

Although still dominated by Oliver Ortmann and Ralf Souquet, both real class acts, the extent of their domination has greatly reduced with lower order individual winners rising from 11 to 19, almost a factor of 2, it’s easy to see the growth of the game in Europe over the last 20 years.

The level of the game in general has risen so high making it much harder for the likes of Ortmann and Souquet to continue to dominate the tour, although, having said that, Ortmann currently stands as the European number 1 ranked player, which shows what a class act Ortmann really is. To continue to produce such a high level of pool after nearly 20 years on the Eurotour is a testament to his commitment to and knowledge of the game. Citing this as my example, I’d put that up as evidence against statements made that the sport is really down to luck, and that anyone can win if the balls are rolling for them. This may be the case in the odd individual match, but as you can see from these statistics, ultimately the cream will rise to the top.

Many new and younger players are also now beginning to demonstrate the strength in depth that Europe is now producing in American Pool, arguably rivalling the USA, but although still behind the Philippines and some other Asian countries.

The current top 8 on the Eurotour are:

1. Oliver Ortmann 2415
2. Niels Feijen 2275
3. Fabio Petroni 2130
4. Thomas Engert 2105
5. Konstantin Stepanov 2075
6. Christian Reimering 2065
7. Jonni Fulcher 2050
8. Nick Van den Berg 2045

Going into the next event in Germany Ortmann is defending a 2nd place, Feijen a 3rd and Van den Berg a 5th, the other players have less to do to keep their points, so it’s possible that we might see the places at the top change around quite a bit after this event, with less than 100 points separating 8th from 3rd place it’s very tight. Potentially any one of these players could go to no 1 with a victory in Sindelfingen, one of the players’ favourite venues.

Americal pool in Europe is clearly still on the up, and with more TV coverage of the Eurotour on Eurosport and increased sponsorship deals, the money is slowly starting to come. The richest tournament held so far in Europe was the Eurotour stop in Liberec where the total prize fund was 50,000 Euros, and the top spot took home 6000 Euros. Let's continue to promote this sport and the interest in it and hopefully the pool players will soon be able to make a living more comparible with Snooker.

Watch this space for more coverage of the Eurotour, and hopefully some player interviews and other thoughts and views on the state of American pool in Europe.

Snooker: Who Will Win the World Snooker Championships?

On the Snooker Scene Blog, Dave H asks who's going to win the World Championships that start this weekend. I posted a comment to his post with my own views. Here's pretty much what I said:

It's not an easy year to predict who is going to win the World Championships, but I'm going to give it my best shot anyway. I was really impressed with Dott in the China Open and fancy him to get to the semis at least.

The biggest match in the first round is clearly Ding - Ronnie. I think Ding might have his snooker head on for Sheffield and see him beating Ronnie (who's going to retire again when he gets beat - only joking! :-) ). Once Ding gets past Ronnie I can see him going all the way to the final.

I think Doherty's got a really good draw and can see him beating Stevens, Murphy and Selby on the way to the final.

Hendry's form hasn't been so good for a few years now. For me he just doesn't look solid on his shots like he did back in the 90s (I've got the vids to prove it!), so I think Selby will beat him in the quarters.

That leaves a KenDinger of a final!! Ding won't beat Hendry's record at the first time of asking so Ken's going to win his second World Crown and reclaim the number one spot.

I mean, Ding winning at his first attempt, ...that would be like a rookie F1 Grand Prix driver getting 3 podiums in his first 3 races and winning a GP in his first year wouldn't it!!! Silly idea!

Here's looking forward to a good 17 days.

Andy