Today and Thursday see the culmination of what will be 16 days of snooker in total at Crondon Park in the Championship League. The event is broadcast on the internet only, on the World Snooker and usual betting streams, and the format has seen 7 groups of 7 players with the winner making up a 7 man strong winners group. The men involved in the winners group are: Ricky Walden, Joe Perry, Judd Trump, Stephen Maguire, Shaun Murphy, Martin Gould and Ryan Day.
Here are the fixtures for the round robin games:
Wednesday 5th March:
Ricky Walden Vs Joe Perry
Judd Trump Vs Stephen Maguire
Shaun Murphy Vs Martin Gould
Ryan Day Vs Ricky Walden
Joe Perry Vs Judd Trump
Stephen Maguire Vs Shaun Murphy
Martin Gould Vs Ryan Day
Ricky Walden Vs Judd Trump
Joe Perry Vs Stephen Maguire
Shaun Murphy Vs Ryan Day
Judd Trump Vs Ryan Day
Martin Gould Vs Stephen Maguire
Thursday 6th March:
Ricky Walden Vs Martin Gould
Joe Perry Vs Shaun Murphy
Stephen Maguire Vs Ryan Day
Judd Trump Vs Martin Gould
Joe Perry Vs Ryan Day
Ricky Walden Vs Shaun Murphy
Judd Trump Vs Shaun Murphy
Joe Perry Vs Martin Gould
Ricky Walden Vs Stephen Maguire
Semi- Finals:
Group Place 1st Vs Group Place 4th
Group Place 2nd Vs Group 3rd
The Final
Here's what I make of the chances of the 7 players battling out for the title of 2014 Championship League winner and a place in the 2014 Champion of Champions:
Ricky Walden: Ricky was the winner of the first group, playing some decent snooker, but nothing special and I did wonder at the time how he won the final against Judd Trump. His form has been nothing special since then with a quarter-final at the Masters and a Last 16 at the Welsh Open in the only 2 tournaments he's been in since. Looking at the other players in the group and some of the momentum they'll be bringing in with them, it's hard to see Ricky making the semi-finals, especially as he could be a touch short on match practice and will need a good start.
Predicted Finish: 6th in the group
Joe Perry: Joe was the winner of group 2 in a very impressive group performance only losing 1 group game, before getting a decent semi-final win and beating Trump 3-0 in 30 minutes in the group final. He's played very well all season and has backed that up recently by making the Welsh Open semi-finals and the German Masters quarter-finals, losing on both occasions to Ding Junhui. I think Perry is certainly a dark horse for the win this in the next couple of days, having been in good form all season and starting to beat some of the best players again.
Predicted Finish: Losing semi-finalist
Judd Trump: Judd was the winner of group 3, having also been in the finals of groups 1 and 2, and he's played some decent snooker in the last month or 2, and hasn't played particularly badly all year, but he seems to have been lacking a bit of the cutting edge he had around a year or two ago, and also lacking a large portion of luck this year. If the luck could just turn Judd's way for the next couple of days, it could kick start his season with 4 ranking events still to play, and if he could gain some confidence here, he could use it to go on and win a big one. He made the German Masters final at the start of February and had it not been for some Ding brilliance he could well have taken the title there. I think he'll go far this week.
Predicted Finish: Group Winner
Stephen Maguire: Stephen won group 4 of the Championship League at his first attempt, avoiding the same embarrassments of last year when he played on 6 groups only not to make the winners group. Maguire's been playing ok but not great recently, though he was suffering from back problems in Wales last week where he was knocked out in the last 16. If he has been able to recover enough to get some good practice in for this one then he has every chance of winning this, though things could crash and burn for him if he hasn't been able to shake off the pain of last week.
Predicted Finish: Group runner-up
Shaun Murphy: Shaun won group 5 of the Championship League about a month ago, just a couple of days after winning the Gdynia Open. Shaun is probably one of the form men of this group, though he hasn't made it past the Last 16 in a full ranking event this season, and after a surprising Last 32 defeat at the Welsh Open from 3-1 up, he will want to put all that behind him with a good performance. Shaun's been working hard ahead of the month of snooker, but he won't just be regarding this as match practice, he'll by trying 100% for the win. I'd be slightly surprised if he didn't make the group semi-finals.
Predicted Finish: Losing group semi-finalist
Martin Gould: Martin group 6 of the Championship League, and is the defending champion from last year so he clearly is a big fan of the short format at Crondon Park. However, I was pretty surprised when he won group 6 after playing pretty badly all season, and then he followed it up with a loss in the China Open qualifier and a Last 64 loss in the Welsh Open, so he is clearly struggling and with a winners group full of top players, he might not be able to turn things around in the next 2 days.
Predicted Finish: 7th in the group
Ryan Day: Ryan was the winner of group 7 just yesterday, and has played pretty well in the 4 groups he was involved in. Often the group 7 winner has been able to take some of their momentum into the winners group and have a good run, and I wouldn't be surprised if Day managed this as well, especially as he has been playing some decent stuff away from Crondon as well, making the German Masters semi-finals. I think he has a great chance of making the semi-finals, but unfortunately so does everyone else in the group, so it will be very tough for the Welshman.
Predicted Finish: 5th in the group
Anyway, whatever happens it will be a good couple of days of snooker at Crondon Park, and I'm looking forward to watching as much of it as I can unfold on the streams as the Championship League is one of my favourite little events for some strange reason.
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