The Snookerbacker Blog

There is a piece in The Guardian today about John Higgins here which promises more tomorrow.

It talks of the timing of his meeting in Kiev in relation to his family life, with lots of detail.

John’s dad is also very ill according to Sportingintelligence, which may delay his comeback.

My dad died of cancer, so I have the deepest sympathy for him as he copes with a terrible illness affecting a person he loves dearly.

Has Matt put the cat amongst the pigeons?

There has been a right old tussle going on over the first set of matches in the Prediction Contest Event 4.

The leader Lorraine is proving a real front runner with 10 of the 11 winners in the first set of matches, this is a feat matched by edo but he remains two frames behind the leader as his loser Shaun Murphy scored zero whereas Lorraine’s loser, Mark Selby won two frames.

Remember we have now entered the second part of the contest where all could change when your five nominated players start scoring for you, but the leaderboard at the moment reads:

1. Lorraine 32 frames

2. edo 30

=3. Joe Gibney 29

=3. kj bets 29

There are then 11 players on a total of 27 frames, it’s still all to play for as all the top three names above had today’s loser Matthew Stevens in their second stage line up. Is it opening up nicely for kjbets – whoever he is and the chasing pack?

Click here to watch the BBC footage of the Rocket’s incredible 147. The guy is insane, brilliant, rude, flawless, disrepectful and incredible all rolled into one. Watch the interview with our Rob afterwards here.

He’s madder than mad Jack McMad winner of last year’s Mr Madman Competition. Ronnie asks about the 147 prize after a couple of pots, gets to 140 and goes to shake hands with King without potting the black. Only for Jan Verhaas to persuade him to pot it.

He says that World Snooker are ‘getting stingier’

‘What’s the point of making a 147 if you’re only going to make £4,000?

‘I thought Barry Hearn was supposed to be putting money in, not taking it out. I only potted the black cause the ref put me on a guilt trip’

Jan Verhaas on Twitter ‘Ronnie made a max. I asked him to pot the last black for his fans. Hope you’re happy!’

Priceless.  

Watch it again here. 

Ronnie: Bonkerooney.

Classic stuff here from Jimmy White after his victory last night. They wouldn’t move the draw around for Ronnie, Jimmy, what a ridiculous notion, this is a ranking event.

The Quo: A little premature.

The Last 32 gets underway today but beforehand there is the small matter of the final Last 64 match, involving none other than the man they call his own harshest critic, Ronnie O’Sullivan.

Rocket Launch Day comes with a potentially tricky tie against fellow ‘geezer’ Mark King, who was in decent form last week in Shanghai in spells and could prove hard to handle if Ron is in one of his moods.

Yesterday saw three whitewashes in the afternoon, Hendry, Williams and Ding all comfortably through. Mark in particular looked in fine shape and is now awaiting The Captain, Ali Carter tomorrow. Ali has updated ‘The Captain’s Log’ for us and his latest instalment can be viewed here.

Last night saw a very scrappy affair between Jimmy White and Paul Davison, who at times resembled a rabbit in the headlights. Jimmy’s experience carried him through, but he’ll have to up his game to another planet if he is to remotely trouble either Ronnie or King on Thursday night.

Twitter is a real resource sometimes and Jimbo seems to be addicted to it at the moment. Last night you ended up with details of what he had for dinner, seeing the antics of his dining colleagues JV and Ken as well as his planned late night poker antics with a few of the boys back at the hotel. Highly amusing stuff.

Mark Selby didn’t have such a laugh last night, the Jester sporting a new very dapper outfit could not handle the Hawk. Barry Hawkins producing some excellent snooker early on and taking a scrappy decider to send the disappointed Jester packing.

It was in this match that we were also almost treated to a secret Bazza innovation, the musical re-spot. Hawkins having cleared the colours to force the respotted black was greeted with a fanfare of ‘Rocking all over the World’ by three chord denim clad rockers Status Quo, but when the error was realised they had to put their guitars down. Shame that, because if they’d have carried on they could have changed quickly to ‘Deeper and Down’ after Selby potted the black to actually finish the frame.

In terms of bets, Hawkins winning the last scuppered my interest accumulator, four out of five for the second day running. This correct score lark isn’t that easy either, managed to get one right yesterday but seem to lose on most of them by the odd frame. But if at first you don’t succeed and all that…..

The Hotstepper

12.30pm

Ronnie O’Sullivan 3-0 Mark King (Last 64) 147 FOR THE ROCKET!!!!

You’ve got to fancy Ronnie here, he shouldn’t have a problem with the format so I’ll take him to win 3-0 at 13/5 with Sportingbet.

Matthew Stevens 2-3 Alan McManus McManus and his new cue progress and Matt adds to his vast growing collection of final frame defeats.

Two near-veterans start off the last 32. Matt will still be recovering from being pegged back by Ali last week in Shanghai in dramatic fashion, he really isn’t the best at holding onto a lead. But the short format should in theory suit the quicker starters, but I just have a feeling here that McManus might produce a surprise so I’ll for 3-1 to McManus at 6/1 with Boylesports.

Joe Jogia 1-3 Liu Song Liu finishes with an excellent century break 107

These two have played each other three times and Liu has won them all including two whitewashes. I’m actually going to recommend a bet here of 1 point win on Song at 4/5 with Sportingbet. In terms of a score, let’s have a bash at 3-0 again at 9/2 with Boylesports.

7pm
Jamie Cope 3-2 Dave Harold Still can’t get this bloody frame betting sussed, but four from four again. Deja Vu, anyone following all week will get on Dunn.

Big Dave was very solid against Smurf and any repeat of that form will cause Jamie problems here. But the Shotgun is in decent form and I think can end Dave’s run so I’ll take Cope to win 3-1 which is 3/1 at Boylesports.

Mike Dunn 1-3 Marcus Campbell

These two have never met and there isn’t a great deal to go on (Incorrect, apparently Dunn won their one meeting 5-1). Campbell is probably the more experienced of the two on the TV and has shown hints of form early season. I think he’ll just have the edge here and again I’ll take the 3-1 scoreline at 7/2 with Boylesports.

The correct score accumulator pays a woeful 2355/1 at Boylesports, but I’ll be giving the cross doubles a go again. An accumulator on all recommended winners pays just over 16/1 at Ladbrokes.

Best of Luck if playing.

Ali Carter has been giving more of his thoughts about the World Open as well as insights into Marco Fu’s breakfast habits and his ongoing strange obsession with sand here.

Nigel faces Stephen next round.

I’m a bit confused as to why they didn’t televise the draw today. Maybe there were a few too many mistakes by that really important guy with a chain around his neck. You give them bling and titles and they still don’t get that Jimmy plays Ronnie in the next round. Get it? Some people eh?

Anyway, the Captain has a toughie against Mark Williams, there’s the tussle of the old stagers when Matthew Stevens takes on Angles McManus, there’s the biggest thing ever to hit Stoke when Jamie Cope and Big Dave do battle and we have the ‘Little against Large’ clash when Nigel Bond confronts Stephen Lee.

Judd will be looking for revenge for Shanghai against Maguire, who despite an anonymous threat earlier will continue to be portrayed as a doughnut, until he starts behaving himself.

Anyway, the draw is below.

Monday, September 20

Afternoon session

Ronnie O’Sullivan v Mark King (Last 64)
Matthew Stevens v Alan McManus
Joe Jogia v Liu Song

7pm
Jamie Cope v Dave Harold
Mike Dunn v Marcus Campbell

Tuesday, September 21

1pm
Ali Carter v Mark Williams
Jimmy Michie v Ding Junhui
Stephen Lee v Nigel Bond

7pm
Stephen Hendry v Mark Davis
Peter Ebdon v Fergal O’Brien

Wednesday, September 22

12.30pm
Neil Robertson v David Morris
Ken Doherty v Barry Hawkins
James McBain v Ricky Walden

7pm
Judd Trump v Stephen Maguire
Martin Gould v Matthew Couch

Thursday, September 23

12.30pm
Ronnie O’Sullivan v Jimmy White
Marco Fu v Andrew Higginson

Will there be a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow for the Whirlwind?

Another day of ‘quickfire’ snooker beckons on this rainy sleepy Sunday. This afternoon sees Stephen Hendry trying to halt his slide down the rankings and fellow former World Champion Mark Williams takes to the baize. Then this evening we have ‘the main event’, Jimmy’s back in town and he’s buzzing, right?

So what do we think of it so far? That isn’t cue for a mass pantomime audience response as it would be nice to gauge opinions on this experiment. On the plus side, we get to see everyone, I always like one table set ups and this delivers on that. The matches weren’t great yesterday, performances were mixed and for me we had to wait until the bananas were delivered late on to see someone really perform, Dave Harold played very solidly in butchering poor Shaun Murphy. I think he needs to start saying his prayers more regularly, as either there is no God or he ain’t listening to our Smurf.

But it is nice to see the players getting edgy and they were obviously over-cautious, well apart from Un-Nooh who it appears stopped reading his coaching manual after Chapter One; ‘Potting’. Mrs Snookerbacker also likes the grey carpet and the set in general, I have to say I agree and having the practice tables visible as part of the BBC coverage is a small plus too.

Though this is outweighed by 75% of the commentary, which I’m afraid to say is far superior in terms of information on Eurosport. I’m afraid Dennis in particular is beginning to get on my nerves and nobody likes it when they are talked to like an idiot, which some of them tend to do sometimes. At least you can rely on Willie to slip in the odd bit of gambling talk to keep us entertained, sighing when he’s obviously done his conkers in-running.

But there are more minuses, the music between frames and flashing lights needs to stop now, it’s a bit embarrassing when it focuses in on old Jock and Ethel McTavish who have come in for a warm on the bus with their £1 OAP discount ticket. Barry, please, I shouldn’t have to say it again, it isn’t darts and it never will be. I still am in the minority however of thinking they should stick with the walk-on music, just a little more imagination from the players or their ‘people’ is needed.

Jimmy asked people on Twitter what his should be, it remains to be seen if he’s listened to any of them, I suggested a couple. Surely Big Dave should change immediately from the god damn awful Florence and the Machine rubbish to something by Bananarama. As much as I like our Ali, surely a reference to flying in his song is long overdue. Come on chaps, get with the programme….

A lot of snooker fans and some of the players are not happy that so many ranking points are available at an event like this. But I’m not too bothered about that as I’m sure the lucky chap who takes home the £100k at the end of the week won’t be, I won’t be feeling too sorry for him.

In terms of performances yesterday, I’ve already mentioned that I thought Dave played very well. Mass counselling is always needed after Stuart ‘Agadoo’ Pettman appears on our screens, not just to get over his latest haircut but this time for his millions of adoring fans in places like Wigan, where any haircut goes, to recover from what was surely one of the biggest meltdowns ever televised on the baize against sulky Maguire. Mags looked to be cueing well straight off and is usually a decent starter, but then he started acting like a bit of a doughnut again. He’s lucky to be in ‘the hat’ for the next round, I fear Pettman may be contemplating the future this morning; Green Baize or Black Lace?

Ali didn’t play well against his Thai opponent, who is so thin I think his bones may actually be half-man half-chicken. Ebdon was solid enough and comfortably took care of the Nugget, Robbo looked edgy and I do hope this slower version of him isn’t going to become the norm, but he won through against tough old Dotty and lives to fight another day, even though he still hasn’t changed his song back to Thunderstruck.

In terms of the betting, yesterday I managed four out of five winners but didn’t get any of the scores correct. I did end up having a bet on Big Dave as I thought the price was out of kilter with recent form, so altogether not a bad start to a small stakes betting event.

'This music is a bit noisy and those lights are hurting my eyes, pass the toffees Cyril that nice boy Selby is on next''

2pm
Result: Stephen Hendry 3-0 Bjorn Haneveer

Bjorn is available at 6/4 to win this. Hendry ain’t playing well but I still get the feeling he’ll scrape through here, so I’ll take our Stevie to win a tense decider 3-2 at 4/1 with Sportingbet.

A convincing win in the end for Hendry, he’s up and running. Bjorn had his chances but felt the pressure and never looked like challenging.

Result: Mark Williams 3-0 Igor Figueiredo

MJW takes on everyone’s favourite Brasilian German Igor, who has had a great start to his professional career, will he cut the mustard on TV though? I think this might be the match of the afternoon and I’ll take Mark to win 3-1 at 5/2 with Boylesports.

Bursts from Igor to suggest he’ll be back on the screens soon, but Williams produces a clinical performance and is the best player we’ve seen so far. Still can’t crack this score mullarkey. The Captain awaits….

Result: Ding Junhui 3-0 Adrian Gunnell

Ding is another struggling for form but there isn’t enough to suggest a shock is on the cards here. I’ll take him to win this 3-0 at 3/1 with Boylesports.

Ding completes Whitewash afternoon, let’s hope Jimmy follows suit later before what I think will be a close one.

7pm

Result: Jimmy White 3-1 Paul Davison

Jungle Jimmy the Whirlwind of Old London Town takes to the stage and hopefully his adoring fans will turn out in droves. He faces the relative unknown 39 year old Davison and you would expect Jimmy’s experience to tell here, but as ever with Jimbo, expect the unexpected. I’ll take him to win 3-0 and complete a whirlwind whitewash that’s 4/1 at Boylesports.

Jimmy not impressive, but at least he wins against an opponent that looked solid first frame then didn’t….

Result: Mark Selby (109) 2-3 (127) Barry Hawkins

The Jester enters the frey no doubt with a new set of visual gags and one-liners to entertain the late night stragglers. He’s such a hoot. But this is a tricky opener and I wouldn’t take the silly odds on him to win, Hawkins is a fine player and the TV won’t phase him, I think this will be close but given Mark’s final frame pedigree I’ll take him to edge it 3-2 which is 7/2 at Boylesports.

Cracking match, down to the wire, Hawkins wins on the pink.

I’ll be cross-doubling again to small stakes and throwing my £2 into the bookies benevolent fund by backing the accumulator at a miserly 1353/1 at Boyles. If you just fancy a roll up on the predicted winners this pays just on 13/2 at Ladbrokes.

Good Luck if you’re having a go and let’s hope for a decent day’s snooker.

Don’t forget you can read Ali Carter’s Captain’s Log exclusively on the blog here.

Can be viewed here. He hasn’t played since May and he doesn’t talk to Pat anymore, wonder why?