Category: Snooker

• World No 1 reels off six frames in a row to win 6-2
• Trump will play Barry Hawkins in the final

Judd Trump reeled off six frames in succession to beat Kyren Wilson 6-2 and secure his place in the final of the UK Championship for the first time since 2020. The world No 1 capitalised on mistakes from his misfiring opponent to exact some measure of revenge for defeats in finals in Xian and Belfast this season.

While Trump produced nothing like the form he showed when he swept aside Zhang Anda in the last eight, it proved more than enough to line him up for another shot at the prestigious trophy he lifted in 2011.

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• Saturday showdown between world’s top two players
• ‘You need someone on your heels to keep pushing you’

Judd Trump is relishing the next chapter of his emerging rivalry with Kyren Wilson after the pair swept into the UK Championship semi-finals in York on Friday.

Trump compiled four centuries and 527 points without reply in his 6-2 win over Zhang Anda while Wilson overcame the tournament’s surprise package Michael Holt 6-3.

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• Hawkins comes from 4-2 down to seal 6-4 victory
• Defending champion O’Sullivan says: ‘I’m used to it’

Ronnie O’Sullivan crashed out on the opening day of the UK Championship with a 6-4 defeat by Barry Hawkins in York. Hawkins reeled off four frames in a row to haul back a 4-2 deficit and clinch only his third win over O’Sullivan, the defending champion, in 21 career attempts.

It was a remarkable revival by the 45-year-old Hawkins, who compiled four consecutive half-centuries that left the eight-time champion stuck in his seat for three straight frames.

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• Player guilty of providing inside information on match
• Other charges relating to separate incident dismissed

Mark King has been banned from snooker for five years after being found guilty of match fixing.

An independent disciplinary committee found the 50-year-old Englishman guilty of one count of match fixing and one count of providing inside information on a match. The former Northern Ireland Open champion was suspended by the sport’s world governing body, the WPBSA, in March 2023 after suspicious betting was reported on his match with Joe Perry in the previous month’s Welsh Open.

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• Allen: Cheltenham conditions ‘absolutely embarrassing’
• Judd Trump records the 999th century of his career

Mark Allen has hit out at “embarrassing” playing conditions at the British Open in Cheltenham, adding the table he won his first-round match on “needs to be burned”.

Allen, who was world No 1 from May to August of this year, defeated Gary Wilson 4-3 on table two at the Centaur, a venue at Cheltenham racecourse. Afterwards, he alleged that doors were left open at the venue, making the playing area “cold and humid” and the table “unplayable”.

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The experiences of the world’s leading players are key to understanding snooker’s current unpredictability

Ostensibly, sport aims to answer one question: who is the best? Humans being humans, we naturally invest it with meaning beyond that – the teams we support are ours forever, a fixed part of our identity representing values and a way of life. We keep coming back because we have no choice.

Individual sports, though, are different, players necessarily transient, so what keeps us coming back is the competition itself. And for that reason, there is greater onus on it to provide a satisfying outcome: we want our world championships won by the best player in the world, and Kyren Wilson, snooker’s newly minted king – a terrific talent and worthy winner – is, on the face of it, no such thing.

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• Welsh qualifier will face Kyren Wilson after shock run to final
• Jones hits back at beaten opponents’ complaints over his style

Jak Jones sealed his shock World Snooker Championship final place by beating Stuart Bingham 17-12 – and branded his beaten opponents “pathetic” for complaining about his playing style.

The world No 44 will face Kyren Wilson in the two-day final starting on Sunday after Wilson overcame David Gilbert 17-11. Both Bingham and Judd Trump, whom the Welshman beat in the last eight, implied that Jones’ frustrating tactics had affected their rhythm and ultimately contributed to their defeats.

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• Only remaining seed holds 14-10 advantage
• Stuart Bingham and Jak Jones level at 8-8

Kyren Wilson needs three more frames to reach a second World Snooker Championship final after opening up a 14-10 lead over David Gilbert. The pair were tied at 8-8 after the morning session but Wilson, the only seed left, won six of the eight frames in the evening to take a commanding lead.

It would have been virtually game over had Gilbert not won the final frame with a break of 101, but he goes into Saturday’s final session as a big underdog, with the winner to face Stuart Bingham or Jak Jones, who are locked together at 8-8.

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A world championship move away from its storied home would have implications in south Yorkshire beyond snooker

Picture the scene. There is live sport on a big screen, and on the artificial grass deckchairs are laid out, with pints of lager flowing. It sounds like a scene from continental Europe during a major football tournament: but this is Sheffield city centre on a grey, murky Friday morning.

It is perhaps fitting that Tudor Square, the part of Sheffield where the Crucible Theatre is situated, is dubbed the “Heart of the City” on the tourist information around town. Because for two weeks every year, snooker and its most iconic venue is at the beating heart of Sheffield – for now, at least.

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• Bingham takes 3-0 lead but Welshman hits back to make it 4-4
• Kyren Wilson calls himself ‘a wally’ after missing chance of 147

There was little to pick between the last four in the World Snooker Championship, with Jak Jones fighting back to 4-4 in his semi-final against Stuart Bingham after Kyren Wilson and David Gilbert also battled to stalemate at the Crucible.

Wilson, the only seed left in the tournament, came from 3-2 and 4-3 down to go in level after the first session in Sheffield. But Jones produced an even braver comeback against the 2015 champion, recovering after a nervy and error-strewn start to turn a 3-0 deficit into parity by the end of the evening.

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An act of decency is being hailed as the greatest sporting gesture ever. Politicians, business folk, celebrities – please take note

You may not be into snooker, dear reader. You may not be into sport at all. But really, this is not about sport. In losing yesterday to Stuart Bingham in the quarter-final of the World Snooker Championship, Ronnie O’Sullivan proved himself a contender for the world’s most sporting sports star. He may have lost, but in doing so he showed there are still standards in public life, and some people do care about doing the right thing. Not something we see often these days.

Here’s what happened. Yesterday afternoon, with Ronnie leading by six frames to five, he potted a black ball. When it was returned to its spot, it should have obstructed his next red ball, making it trickier for him to progress. But there was a tiny divot on the table, and the black ball wobbled ever so slightly from its spot, making access to the red simple. Ronnie wasn’t having any of it. He asked the ref time and again to replace the black to make it more difficult for him. But the black wasn’t having any of it either, and kept bobbling away.

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White lost four finals to Stephen Hendry at the Crucible. Their meeting 30 years ago was the one that really got away

By Steven Pye for That 1980s Sports Blog

Monday, 2 May 1994. Stephen Hendry and Jimmy White are locked in a final-frame decider in the World Championship final. With White leading 37-24 and the table open, even the usually stoic Hendry is showing signs of concern. White bends down to tackle a black he would normally pot with his eyes closed.

It should have been his crowning glory, the moment White conquered his Everest. Instead it was the day the music died. A gasp echoed around the Crucible as White’s attempt at the black failed to threaten the pocket. All he could do was sit, wait and hope that Hendry would give him one more shot.

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