World Chapmpionship ,A Few Thoughts

 Well as we all emerge from our 17 days inside the snooker watching bubble to find sadly that the world hasn't changed a whole lot, I just thought I'd note a few things that stood out for me over the two weeks.So here goes.

1. The Champ

There reallly is only one place to start isn't there & thats with the newly crowned six time world champion.

Such was the effect that his loss to Selby in the 2014 final seemed to have on Ronnie, I , like many others thought the chances of him adding to his previous five world titles were slim.This was borne out  by some pretty insipid performances here since. The first signs that things might be different this year came in his second round match with Ding.This was a close match against one of the games other big names, but unlike in recent years he found a way to win it & then did the same against Williams in the last 8.We'll talk about the semi final later ,but his performance again on day 2 of the final was superb.He may conatantly talk down hw much these big wins mean to him,but make no mistake.equalling the record of his childhood idol Steve Davis will be very special for him.

2. The Defending Champ

Often the crown on a first time world champ weighs heavy throughout the next season & they struggle to produce their best snooker.That certainly was not the case this season for Judd Trump who, if anything, grew into role and dominated the year picking up a record 6 ranking along the way. He seemed to be riding the crest of a wave all the way to breaking the legendary "Crucible Curse" ,but then a global pandemic struck.The great inponderable for Judd willl be, what would haven happened if the tournament had been played as normal in April?, because since action resumed he hasn't looked the same player. His title defence here never really got going  here & he only really limped past Tom Ford & Yan Bingtao ,before Wilson proved far too strong in the quarter final. It will be interesting to see just how he bounces back from this when the new season begins. 

3. Underperforming Big Names

Once again a number of the big names failed to produce on the games biggest stage.First round defeats for Mark Allen ( who admittedy did knock in 5 centuries) Stephen Maguire & Shaun Murphy,who to be fair obviously wasn't there mentally after the recent death of his former manager & friend. Ding Junhui was perhaps a bit unlucky to run in to Ronnie in Rd2  just as he was just showing signs of  finding some form. Neil Robertsons woes continued at the Crucible & its a glaring omission from his otherwise stellar cv that he's never again even  reached the final since his victory in 2010.

4. Emerging Talent?

I think it says a lot for where the game has now got to that a world semi final between Wilson (28) & McGill (29) is seen as a battle of the "young guns" As so often is the case when Ronnie speaks, his over the top way of saying things & the resultant hysteria often belie the more serious point he is making. There are no doubt a lot of talented players down the rankings, but I'd struggle to name any who I could say with certainty would make the leap to the very top. 

5. The Controversies

It wouldn't be a world championship if there wasn't a bit of controversy along the way and the first incident here happened before a ball was even struck.

Having battled his way through qualifying to reach the Crucible for the first time in 12 years, Anthony Hamilton withdrew from the championship on health grounds over fears of the crowd been let in to see the the matches.Anthony has asthma, as well as far as I know is living with his eldery parents & ,quite rightly in my opinion, saw the letting in of crowds  ,all be they limited, as an unnecessary risk. 

Obviously someone withdrawing so close the the event is ot ideal, but the reaction of Barry Hearn left a real sour taste in the mouth. He accused Hamilton of  playing the qualifiers with no intention of ever playing at the venue & thus denying someone a rightful place. He repeated this on every media platform that would give him the space to do so & even took to twitter to take on any of Hamiltons fellow pros who dared support him.

The work Hearn has done to get snooker back to where it is has been phenomenal & getting this event on in the middle of a global pandemic was perhaps his biggest achievement, but that said , every so often  the mask just slips a bit to show a pretty nasty guy.

The arguments didnt stop there & we had "Line of sightgate" between McGill & Jamie Clarke.This was pretty much storm in a teacup stuff & probably boiled down to Clarkes lack of experience in the venue & McGill. like all of us when we're struggling, finding every little thing annoying.It was a pity it blew up the way it did & seemed to have effect Clarke for the rest of that session.

The other big controvery which lit up twitter the other night was the comments of Mark Selby after his defeat in that extraordinary semi filal with Ronnie. Selby accused Ronnie of disrespecting both him & the game with his rather unorthodoxed way of escaping some of the snookers he laid.

Two things with this. Firstly whether he felt this or not, this was not the time to express it & it just had a air of sour grapes about it, Secondly there was no disrespect here to either him or the game. What Ronnie did was exorcise some  of those 2014 demons where he allowed Selby bog him down. Here he made a conscious  decision to go out on his own terms. (Anyone who watched his brilliant Q&A's with Hendry during lockdown will have heard his views on that final) In doing so he may have lost a couple of big frames, but  he kept his momentum  & backed himself to score if he got the chance. he then produced a stunning burst of three frames that will long live in the memory.

6. BBC Coverage

Eyebrows were raised when it was announced in the week before the championship that Hazel Irvine wouldn't be part of the team for this year,but we really shouldn't have worried. I think the coverage this year was superb. Jason Mohammad  really grew in to his role as main presenter, bringing a perfect mix of in depth analysis from the pundits & also throwing in some  good fun too. Also excellent was Seema Jaswal & Radzi who brought a real infectious enthusism to proceedings.

7.Those Semi finals!

Last Friday has been hailed as the most exciting day in snooker since the '85 final & it's hard to argue. Plenty has been written about both so I'm not going to rehash them,but I think the most notable thing here was the amount of texts & Whatsapps I got from people on friday who would not be big snooker people.This is what snooker & in particular the world championship brings.That long unfolding drama,with two players with nowhere to hide leaving  everything on the table. Its why snooker makes the blood flow through our veins and the hair on back of our necks stand like no other sport can!!

Conclusion "Born to Run"

Finally in my life I have been lucky enough to see Bruce Springsteen live on a number of occasions & I  always felt the highlight & lowlight of every gig is hearing "Born to Run"Its the highlight because its my favourite song & the lowlight, because once its over I wont hear it again. The secret of course is to try not to think of it in either of those terms & to just enjoy it & savour it in the moment.  I think we also need to look at Ronnie that way & instead of constantly talking about the record books & arguing over who is the GOAT, lets instead enjoy the now with our own "Rock & roll star".Long may he reign.

The Games Greatest ,My Two Cents

In the absence of actual snooker to talk about in recent weeks & following an interview with Barry Hearn, the corner of twitter that the sport inhabits  has been alught with people discussing their all time top 10's. So I decided , I may as well dust off the old blog & throw my own opinon in to the mix.

Two quick things before I start, Firstly in these old pub arguments, with so many variables, there can be no definitive right or wrong answer,We can all just offer our own opinions & everyones is as valid as everybody elses, (the one exception here is Michael Mcmullen, who in the recent SnookerScene Podcast was just way off the mark!!) Secondly, my top 10 is taken purely from players I've seen in my lifetime.I am too young to remember Ray Reardon & John Spencer in their prime,so I have left both out of this list.

So anyway lets begin.

10. Mark Selby
A controversial one to start with, putting the three times world champion & long time no.1 so low on the list, but if I'm honest, as a player , there are probably 10 or more I'd rank as at least his equal. the thing that seperates Selby from them is his unbelievable big match temprament. Time and time again he has dug a victory out of nowhere & if you could bottle his bottle, you would be a very rich man. He is an exapmle of what hard work can achieve & an example to any budding snooker player.

9. Judd Trump

As always with these things, the placings are a movable feast, so in a few years time, there is every probability that Trump will be higher than ninth,but for now that is where I rank him. Trumps career has been a curious one of false dawns. As a young teenager ,such was his reputation, that many expected him to do "a Ronnie" and blitz his way on to the circuit,but it didn't quite happen that way. It wasnt until he won the China Open in 2011 & followed it with  world final appearence the following month, that he really arrived as top pro. He followed that up with the UK title that december & it looked like he could go on to dominate the sport for a decade, but again it just didn't happen.

 It wasnt until about 18 months ago. when he made a few changes to his backroom team, including bringing in his brother that he finally started to become the player he's always threatened to be. Far from the world crown weighing heavy on his head, he has instead kicked on, with 6 ranking titles this season & with the combination of his main rivals, not getting any younger, plus no real threat coming through behind, we may well be facing into that decade of dominance I talked about earlier. Time will disclose all.

8.Ding Junhui
if this were a list of the games most influential players, Ding would proably rank a lot higher , such has been his role in the rise of the sports popularity in his home country. This is probably best summed up in the tweet last yr from legendary athlete Michael Johnson, who expressed surprise on a trip to China, that the answer he lept getting to his " who is yur biggest sports star" was a snooker player. His breakthrough victory over Hendry, to win the China Open, while still an amateur propellled him to stardom. The huge weight of expectation placed on him from his adoring fans has not always rested easyily on him, but there is no doubt that he has been a trailblazer for his country & when he has produced his best,there have been few more beautiful breakbuilders in the game.  The one big omission from his cv is the world title, but even if his career finishs without  that wrong been righted, he is by far the best player we have seen emerge from that part of the world & even with so many now coming behind him, they will have to be very special indeed to overtake his achievments in the game.

7. Alex Higgins
Ok , I know! , If i'm not including Reardon because he was past his prime when I started watching snooker how can I include Higgins? Well I suppose the answer is that, although Higgins best days were indeed behind him when the sport came on my radar, I still saw enough glimpses of his genius to appreciate how good he was. The phrase " his own worst enemy" could have invented to describe Alex ,but that should never take away from the snooker player he was. When Alex decided to put it all in to the game, he was simply superb. That 69 break againt Jimmy in '82 will forever be part of snooker folklore. I was lucky enough to be at Goffs in 1989 , where still limping after a broken ankle, he produced a wonderful display to beat Hendry in the final for what turned out to be his last hurrah. Such was his genius, I just don't think I could have this list without him on it

6.Jimmy White
For a generation of snooker fans ,watching Jimmys attempts to claim his elusive world title have scarred them for life,but perhaps , as big a sadness is that his career has been defined by that failure. Reaching 6 world finals in the first place is a phenomenal achievement & when you look at a career haul of around 30  titles , you start to get a picture of how good he was. He is probably the only player to really span the Davis to Hendry era's & was just unlucky, that for about a 10 yr period,  he was the second best in the world behind both.

5. Mark Williams
Into the top 5  then & the first mention of the graduates of the class of '92. Williams, by any measure , has had a superb career. His victory in the 2018 world championship was a sporting fairytale after his career had seemed in terminal decline when hed failed to qualify just 12 months previously. His laid back demeanor belies a ruthless competitor & there have been few better than the Welshman at winning the scrappy frames. For a couple of seasons around the turn of the century he was practically unplayabe. I remeber in 2000, following a second successive Crucible semi final defeat to Williams, John Higgns exclaimed he didnt know what else he could do, that hed played as well as he ever could and had fallen short again.
As can be said about the other members of the '92 club that I've yet to come to, How much would they have won without the other two around?

4. John Higgins
 Into the top 4 or as it might be known, the Mt. Rushmore of the sport. When it comes to matchpay snooker John Higgins there may be equal,but there have been none better the the "Wizard of Wishaw". He has always been granite around the table and if you needed someonw to clear the table to save your life ,your first call would be to this man. The one mystery in his career was the 9 years between his first & second world titles, but once he got his second wind ,he wasnt long rectifying that, with two more following in quick succession.  One of the joys of my snooker watching life was a match between him & Ronnie at Goffs in the late '90's. I had a standing ticket & positioned myself on the upper level looking directly down at the table. the exhibition of break building & cueball control I saw that nght will always stay with me. Higgins is one of those players that its a pleasure to watch constructing a break, & equally watchable in a safety battle , because he just comes up with the most exquisite shots. The evidence of the last three finals suggest another world title might be just out of his reach now, but I would love to see him lift another one.

3. Stephen Hendry
I suppose its a sign I'm getting older, that while I'm still banging the drum for the Davis era, there is a whole generation now who don't remember the Hendry one.Make no mistake though, (& as a Davis fan how I hated him) Stephen Hendry was for a period as close to unbeatable as you could get. In the early'90's in particular he cast a shadow over the rest like we will proably never see again. he didn't just walk around the table ,he prowled! A superb long potter & break builder, it was almost the worst thing you could ,to leave him with no choice but to try pot something ,His record of titles speaks for itself. The main reason I place him third behind the two I will list ahead of him is ,i think his one failing was his lack of a real "B game" , he rarely won ugly. Now in the '90's it can be reasonalby argued he played so well so often he didn't need one & in truth he prob was just too stubborn in his approach to develop one, but it is still a black mark against him & possibly a contributing factor in what looked a premature retirement.

2. Steve Davis
It has become fashionable in recent years to put down the standard of play in the '80's, but to do so belittles some excellent players & none more so than "The Nugget". If Hendry cast a shadow over the rest in the '90's ,then we are talking about Davis as a sort of solar eclipse in the 80's. A well honed technique, a religious dedication to practice & a ruthless streak when it came to winning ,saw him become one of the most famous sportsmen in th world. What set him apart from others though was his almost childlike fascination with the game. He seemed to see every frame as a puzzle that needed to be solved and so every challenge was exciting. In his latter career he still had moments that served to remind people how good he was, be it his comeback victory over an on fire O'Sullivan to win 1997 Masters, reaching the 2005 UK championship final or beating reigning champion John Higgins, to reach the Crucible quarters in 2010. i have to say nothing in this sport annoys me more than people failing to respect just how good Steve was.

1.Ronnie O'Sullivan
There really isn't anyone who disputes this anymore is there? Not only is Ronnie the greatest snooker player we have seen , or are ever likely to see, he is also possibly the most natural sporting genius we will ever see in any sport. From winning that first UK at 17, to still producing the standard he is now 27 years later says it all. yes there have been stumbles along the & times when his life off the table has threatened to overtake his career on it, but time & time again he has managed to successfully steer things around. The one stick that people have left to beat him with has been his failure to beat Hendrys haul of 7 world titles,but at this stage, I don't think the fact that Hendry enjoyed a couple more good fortnights in Sheffield is enough measured against everything  else Ronnie has done.

So there you have it. I'm sure many will disagree with my choices, but they are my opinions.Feel free to disagree in the comment section here or on Twitter.