Stephen Maguire defeated Shaun Murphy 10-9 in the final match of the 2008 World Snooker China Open, held yesterday at the Students University Stadium in Beijing. For Maguire, it was the latest win in a row of successes following his triumph at the Northern Ireland Trophy, his runner up at the UK Championship and his current 147 maximum break at the China Open semi-finals.
By collecting the 2008 World Snooker China Open championship, Maguire, 27, joins a limited, noble list of snooker players who had won in four ranking titles; Stephen Hendry, Steve Davis, Ronnie O’Sullivan, John Higgins, Mark Williams and Jimmy White are among them. In addition to the respectable title, Maguire took home £72,000 prize including £22,000 prize for his 147 maximum break. Next month, he will be facing Anthony Hamilton in the first round of the 2008 World Snooker Championship.
25-years-old Shaun Murphy, 2008 World Snooker China Open runner up, is still placed at the top of the current world ranking despite his surprising defeat to Maguire. At the opening round of the 2008 World Snooker Championship he will be playing against Dave Harold.
Up until yesterday, Ronnie O’Sullivan was the bookmakers’ leading candidate for the 2008 World Snooker Champion. Now, two-times World Champion seems closer to relive his days as the bad boy snooker. The Rocket caused turmoil when made a sexually explicit remark, followed by suggestive waving of the microphone at the press conference that followed his match against Marco Fu at the 2008 World Snooker China Open. O’Sullivan will be facing, once again, disciplinary acts. The pre-press conference match ended with O’Sullivan loss to Fu 5-4, by the way.
And on the tables, China Open’s semi-finals came to an end with Stephen Maguire beating Ryan Day 6-5 and achieving a 147 maximum break on the second frame. On the final match, scheduled to tomorrow, Maguire will be playing against Shaun Murphy who defeated Mary Selby 6-3.
The 2008 World Snooker Championship is getting closer. Within a month, a new World Snooker Champion will be crowned. Judging by a random sample of online betting sites, Ronnie O’sullivan has the best odds of digging the third World Championship title in his career. His main obstacles on his way to the championship are last year’s runner up Mark Selby and 2005 champion Shaun Murphy. What do you think? Who’s gonna pot the last black at the Crucible?
In his blog, L A Odicean writes that snooker (and golf) are the easiest sports to fix. Both are individual sports often gambled upon and in both of them missing a shot does not have to look that obvious. But unlike golf players who’ve been practicing their sports on green grass among white collars, the natural habitats of snooker players are smoky billiards parlor swarming with dubious characters.
Statistically, there have been more cases of match fixtures in group sports such as basketball and football than in snooker. All through the history of snooker, only few cases of match fixing have been investigated and led to the guilty conclusion.
Most recently, the 2007-8 Malta Cup was investigated by the UK Gambling Commission after local bookmakers informed them on unusual betting patterns during the snooker tournament (which ended, by the way with Shaun Murphy 9-3 triumph over Ken Doherty. The announcement on the suspected fixed match were released in mid February, about a week after the Malta Cup final match); no news since then.
In the farther past, two cases of match fixing in snooker resulted in the players ban. In 2006, Australian snooker player Quinten Hann was found guilty of deliberately losing to Ken Doherty at the 2005 China Open for unheard of amounts of money. Despite his denial, he was banned from playing snooker (or any other game of billiards) for 8 years and was fined £10,000.
(At this point, it might be appropriate to remark that fixing the China Open snooker match wasn’t the first encounter bad boy Hann had with the law).
South African player Peter Francisco was banned for 5 years after found fixing a match against Jimmy White at the 1995 World Championship. The unexpected number of bets put on the outcome 10-2 to Jimmy White added to the fact that it was the final score of the match led the World Snooker Association to investigate the case and to eventually find him guilty of fixing the snooker match.
2007 World Snooker Champion John Higgins will be competing against Matthew Stevens on the first round of the 2008 World Championship scheduled to begin on April 19, 2008 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield. Last year’s runner up Mark Selby is put up against Mark King and other interesting duos include Ronnie O’sullivan vs.Liu Chuang, Steven Hendry faces Mark Allen and veteran Steve Davis will play against Stuart Bingham. The World Snooker Championship draw was broadcast live, for the first time at the sponsors’ website 888.
"Matthew is one of the toughest I could have got" Higgins responded to the draw that placed him against two-times World Championship runner up whose World Snooker Championship record includes zero first round losses. Ronnie O’sullivan, who won the UK Championship title when he was only 17, gets a chance to revive his teen spirit in his first round match against 17 years old Liu Chuang. The latter was thrilled to find out he was drawn to play against his role model. Mark King who has drawn Jimmy White out of the competition will be challenging Mark Selby, who at the 2007 World Snooker Championship waived the title after losing 13-18 to the Wizard of Wishaw.
The 2008/9 World Snooker Championship draw will be broadcast live on the internet for the first time in snooker history. Starting on 11 PM (European Time) with the pre-draw build up, the online broadcast will enable snooker fans from across the globe to know, in real time, who will play against who at this year World Snooker Championship.
The World Snooker Championship itself will take place on April 18 – May 5, 2008 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield. Unfortunately, this year’s World Championship will go without our Jimmy White, who has failed enter the top 16 players after losing 3-10 to Mark King. If won, it was Jimmy’s 26th World Snooker Championship, which is an impressive achievement as it is.
Hurry up to see by yourself who will compete against 2007 World Snooker Champion John Higgins. The draw will be broadcast on 888Snooker Website.
Snooker champion John Higgins is launching a new World Series of snooker tournaments. Consists of 4 tournaments, the tour will be hosted by different European cities including Moscow, Warsaw, Jersey and Amsterdam and will be expand to other parts of the continent for the next season.
Asian Billiards & Snooker Championships coming up
The preparations to the 7th Asian Billiards and 9th U-21 Asian Snooker Championships Asian Billiards and U-21 Asian Snooker Championships are at their peak. The notable snooker championships will feature 5 world championships and competitors from 16 different Asian countries China’s Hong Kong, India, Singapore, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Thailand, are among them Vietnam. The hosting country, Myanmar is also sending five representatives to the competition including the country’s best billiards player Kyaw Oo. Both championships will be held at the Kandawgyi Palace Hotel on April 5-12, 2008.
Pakistan’s Junior National Snooker Championship - Results
Local snooker players Muhammad Afzal and Sindh’s Ahad Ali Khan has counted their 3rd win in a row on the second day of Pakistan’s Junior National Snooker Championship, which took place last week at the Amir Bakhsh Billiards Hall in Karachi. Among the young snooker talents was son of former World Amateur Snooker Muhammad Yousuf, Azeem Yousuf who lost to Tahir Abbas 1-3. Top 2 players from each of the groups will move forward to the quarterfinals.
We all know where Jimmy White is, and if you are following snooker you can probably track Steve Davis too. But where are Alex Higgins, Kirk Stevens and Ray Reardon? Where do the snooker stars go after the cue ball has stopped motionless on the table?
Some of the names that ruled the snooker table at the time snooker ruled the world continued their dominance, struggling with the younger, more focused and highly achieving next generation of snooker while getting used to the smoking and boozing ban during official matches. Others, however, have grown apart from the snooker game and disappeared from the spotlight.
Kirk Stevens, for example. Throughout the first half of 1980s, he was a rising star in the pro snooker circuit. With his all white suite, white shoes, flaunting blond hair and inherent talent for snooker, the Canadian player was the poster boy of snooker. After semi-finalizing the World Snooker Championship for the second time at the age of 25, Stevens drop to the oblivion of snooker hasbeens has begun. Confession of cocaine addiction, accusations of substance abuse during the 1985 Dulux British Open final were the immediate catalysts for Stevens early retirement from snooker at the beginning of the next decade.
Where is he now?
Kirk Stevens returned home to Canada in the beginning of the 1990s. He worked as a car salesman for a few years and then returned to play snooker in local amateur league and won in several Canadian Snooker Championships, most recently in 2002.
Ray Reardon and Alex Higgins were huge snooker stars in the era that preceded snooker’s boom. Reardon won 6 World Snooker Championship titles throughout the 1970s. He remained ranked at number 1 at 50 and continued taking part in ranking tournaments. But not for long, in 1992, aged 60, Reardon has retired, leaving the scene to the younger generation of snooker, headed by Steve Davis and his likes.
Ray Reardon’s name has recently come up connected with Ronnie O’sullivan. Reardon serves as a mentor, advisor and supplemental father figure for the troublesome yet gifted young snooker champion.
Alex Higgins has probably the most puzzling disappearance story in snooker. Apparently, his outstanding achievements in the game (which includes winning two World Championships, one of them on his first trial) and undeniable skill were unparallel to his self distractive urge. Nicknamed "Hurricane", Higgins was involved in numberless controversies and violent incidences (which included head butting a tournament official and threatening to kill snooker opponent) that topped his excessive smoking and drinking (and womanizing and gambling). Currently, struggling with throat cancer, Alex Higgins stays out of the public eye.
