The only downside to this year for may fans will be the absence of the only man to win the event in it's two year history, and that is Ronnie O'Sullivan. Ronnie has decided he doesn't want to come back and defend his title, which he has earned the right to do so by winning it last year along with the 2014 UK Championships, which incidentally he has also chosen not to defend. The discussion on when we will next see the Rocket will rumble on until he next enters an event, with the next two big ones coming up being the Masters (the draw for which will be some time after the UK Championships or during the BBC coverage of the UK Final like it has been in recent years) or the German Masters (qualifiers for which are in December following the UK Championships) but more than likely if he plays again it will be at Sheffield and my opinion is that we may not much longer left to enjoy O'Sullivan's brilliance on our TV screens.
The format isn't always clear to many for the Champion of Champions, so as always I will make things clearer for you all. The event splits the 16 players effectively into four "groups" so that for example group one on Tuesday sees two Last 16 games being played back to back over the best-of-7 frames, with the winners of the two matches in the afternoon then playing in a best-of-11 quarter-final match in the evening, the winner of which moves on to Saturday's semi-finals. This is the same for every group on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday which provides the four players to play out the semi-finals on Saturday, one in the afternoon and one in the evening, each over the best-of-11 frames before the two winners face off for the title in the best-of-19 frames final that is played over two sessions on Sunday. The winner of Group One on Wednesday plays the winner of Group Four from Thursday, and Group Two on Friday plays the winner of Tuesday's Group Three. Got it?
The 16 players as I say have got into this event either by winning a major event (one of the main ranking events or indeed the invitational events such as the prestigious Masters, or the much less prestigious Championship League) or one of the minor ranking European Tour or Asian Tour events that make up the World Snooker calendar. Now i'm going to take you through the draw, by looking at each group and the chances of each player in that group, along with an explanation of how they qualified for Coventry.
Group One (Wednesday 11th November)
Draw:John Higgins Vs Ali Carter
Joe Perry Vs Michael White
Michael White is really not in great form at the moment. Most recently his loss to Ricky Walden in the Last 64 of the Bulgarian Open came from 3-1 ahead and was his third Last 64 exit in the four European Tour events. At the International Championship he made the Last 16 but struggled on the way to doing so, and he then looked very poor in that match against Mark Selby and was duly punished. To go with that he continued his poor head to head record with Mark Davis by losing their match in the first round of the Shanghai Masters 5-1. Put together, that is a very poor run of form to be on and that must be denting his confidence, (most of which he gained by winning the Indian Open in March which was how he qualified for Coventry), as each poor tournament goes by and with a tough opponent like Joe Perry in the first round this week, things won't get any easier for Michael on Wednesday and he will have to work very hard to get out of this mini slump.
Ali Carter graces the Ricoh Arena once again this year, after his emotional return to playing snooker in the UK at this event last year, and the reception he got that afternoon from the crowd brought a tear to the eyes of plenty and i'm sure he'll remember that moment with a great deal of fondness. This year though he has qualified after winning the Paul Hunter Classic in August by beating Shaun Murphy 4-3 in the final. He has not really featured a great deal since that triumph in Furth, failing to qualify for the Shanghai Masters, skipping the recent Bulgarian Open as well as losing in the Last 32 in Mulheim and the Last 64 of the International in Daqing. His first round opponent is also the hugely in form John Higgins so he is going to have hard work in that match from the get go, but Carter will certainly run him close.
Joe Perry's form looks to be improving quite a bit over the course of the last couple of weeks, especially with the scoring he showed at the Bulgarian Open. Despite being knocked out in the Last 32, 4-2 to Michael Holt who is playing very well himself, he knocked in 4 centuries in the 10 frames of the tournament he won which is an incredible ratio. He also reached the quarter-finals of the International Championship losing out to eventual champion John Higgins 6-3. He's certainly the favourite to beat a struggling Michael White in the first round and if he can come through that then he has a decent chance of going on further. The key element to Joe's form is his scoring. He is usually a tight safety player with plenty of knowledge of the game to think of ways out of trouble, but the important thing is taking advantage when he does force a mistake, so if he can carry his scoring form on from Bulgaria then he is going to be a force to contend with in Coventry.
John Higgins comes to the Ricoh Arena off of a very busy, yet productive period of snooker for him. His win at the International Championship is his second ranking title of the season at such an early stage of it too. He also reached the Last 16 of this weekends Bulgarian Open before losing to Mark Williams, who was on fire in that match. Higgins also played in the Asian Tour in the week before the International Championship losing out in a Last 16 decider against Ben Woollaston. So, as Higgins comes into this on Wednesday he's barely had a minute to breathe and all the travelling in this short space of time coupled with the volume of snooker could leave him quite drained with another two very tough matches to win if he is to progress from the group. What he has left in the tank in terms of mental energy, as much as physical is up for debate but his confidence surely could not be higher now given the run he is on and this confidence and fantastic form could be the key factor that pushes him on for this event.
Group Prediction: Higgins to beat Carter 4-2 and Perry to see of White by the same score. Higgins then to beat Perry 6-4 in the Group Final.
Group Four (Thursday 12th November)
Draw:Neil Robertson Vs Rory McLeod
Shaun Murphy Vs Yan Bingtao
Rory McLeod came through to the Champion of Champions with a timely first professional win of any ranking performance when he beat Tian Pengfei to win the Ruhr Open in October as part of the European Tour series for the 2015/2016 season. We all know Rory has been on the circuit for a long time, and on very rare occasions he beats a top player and gets through to the latter stages of an event. The unexpected nature of his win in Mulheim can actually be quite exaggerated by his results either side of that tournament. In International Championship qualifying he lost 6-1 to Daniel Wells without threatening, and in the first round of the Bulgarian Open on Friday he was beaten 4-0 by Sam Baird scoring 23 points in the process. Playing someone who he also has such a bad record against as he does with Neil Robertson I give him very little chance in round one.
Yan Bingtao meanwhile, obviously qualified for this event as the other half of the China B world cup winning duo that included Zhou Yuelong. Yan is not presently on the tour after his tour card was deferred for a year because of visa issues. The main issue for him getting a visa to play snooker in this country may be his age. At 15 years of age he's already showing more talent and potential than a lot of players on the tour have, and I think he can certainly cause Shaun Murphy some problems on Thursday. In fact he would have been disappointed to lose in the first round of the recent Asian Tour event 4-2 to fellow amateur Oliver Brown. His most impressive win is probably a 4-0 Asian Tour win in June 2014 against Stuart Bingham, a man that 11 months later would go on to become world champion. The upshot then is that Yan is a man not to be underestimated and I look forward to seeing how he goes on Thursday afternoon.
Neil Robertson enters this years Champion of Champions with mixed form from the early parts of this snooker campaign. Despite reaching the quarter-finals of the International Championship before losing to Mark Selby, we have seen very little of the Australian in recent times. He has only chosen to enter one of the four European Tour events, which was the Ruhr Open where he lost 4-3 to James Cahill in round one. He also lost in round one of the Australian Open and in round one of the Shanghai Masters both by 5-4 score lines. With all of this Neil may be a little low on confidence, but he will see this period as a chance to ignite his season. He knows he has to step ahead of the UK Championships where he is defending his ranking money from winning the event two years ago. When it comes to Coventry Neil actually has a decent record from the previous two times the event has been held making it out of his group and into the semi-finals on both occasions. His first round opponent in Rory McLeod is one he would expect to beat easily, and following that he can expect a very tough game against the winner of Yan Bingtao or Shaun Murphy so once more it won't be plain sailing for Neil.
Shaun Murphy to me seems like he is cueing really well at the moment, but without getting the little bit of luck to achieve the results that would necessarily justify that. At the International Championship he looked very good in the opening couple of rounds, but there was nothing anyone could have done about how John Higgins played in their Last 16 match. Hence the 6-0 win for Higgins. In the European Tour events Murphy has been going along nicely, getting to every Sunday where he has lost twice in the Last 16, once in the final which was at the Paul Hunter Classic and once most recently at the weekend in Bulgaria. He made 4 centuries over the course of his matches and was striking the cue ball beautifully. In the end he was unlucky to lose to an even more impressive Mark Williams 4-3. Murphy's record in Coventry is odd having failed yet to win a game in the competition, but usually he goes well in these events, in front of a big crowd and the one-table "all eyes on you" set-up so I don't expect this to last much longer. In fact, evidence of how much Murphy likes these events is his record at the Masters in recent years. He won the competition this year for the first time (which is how he has qualified for this years Champion of Champions) and he has been a regular feature in the semi-finals in London, making at least that stage in all of the last 4 years. His aim for this week will be transfer some of that form to the similar sort of set-up for this tournament at the Ricoh Arena.
Group Prediction: Robertson to beat McLeod 4-0, Murphy to beat Bingtao 4-1. Shaun to make the semi-finals beating Neil 6-5.
Group Three (Tuesday 10th November)
Draw:Stuart Bingham Vs Zhou Yuelong
Judd Trump Vs Kyren Wilson
Zhou Yuelong qualified for the Champion of Champions as part of the teenage double act for China B that won the snooker World Cup in Wuxi in June. Zhou unlike his partner Yan is currently on the tour and certainly causing a lot of problems for players already having made it to 62 in the world after a season and a half on tour. That's a good achievement when you consider he's a young Chinese player having to make his trade away from home and his family mainly playing in Europe and the Uk of course. He was just a deciding frame away from the quarter-finals of the recent International Championship, beating Martin Gould before losing 6-5 to Thepchaiya Un-Nooh. In January he did make it to the quarter-finals of one of the Asian Tour events, which is his best run and I don't think Stuart Bingham will be taking him lightly. Given Stuart's form since becoming world champion, Zhou certainly has a chance of victory on Tuesday afternoon.
Kyren Wilson faces a repeat of the Shanghai Masters final here in the opening round of the Champion of Champions. Obviously that 10-9 win against Judd Trump in September won him that tournament which is why he is in this event in the first place, so Judd will be looking to take out some revenge for that here. Kyren will still be buzzing in part from such a major win in September and he's had some tough losses since then. At the Ruhr Open, Aditya Mehta ground him down quite badly, while Allen in the International Championship Last 32 was by no means an easy task and Ryan Day came back at him well from 3-1 down in the recent Bulgarian Open. Judd Trump seemed rejuvenated in Sofia too so beating him again will be an incredibly big ask. In a best-of-7 he'll need to get off to a fast start to give Judd a challenge.
Stuart Bingham continues to struggle as world champion, which is something i'm bored of writing in preview upon preview. Another early exit reigned supreme at the Bulgarian Open as he missed plenty of chances in his 4-3 Last 64 defeat to Mark Allen. The draws haven't been too kind to him on the European Tour at times, but on the other hand that doesn't excuse such a heavy loss in the International Championships to Yu DeLu and so many losses from winning positions. In Bulgaria he was 3-2 ahead against Allen and lost, in Australia he was 4-2 ahead to Fergal O'Brien and lost and he did the same against Fergal from 3-1 ahead in Mulheim. At the Paul Hunter Classic he was a victim to a John Higgins comeback from 3-1 down. This should be hugely worrying to Bingham as it shows a distinctly bad quality of failing to close out matches when you have plenty of chance to do so. I don't see him winning this tournament on current form and he is not a strong contender to do so. With Zhou Yuelong in round one over the best-of-7 frames he will need to be switched on because the young Chinese player has plenty of potential as I've mentioned and he won't fear Stuart and i expect a close match if Zhou plays himself into it early on.
Judd Trump is the man that has qualified for the Champion of Champions by winning the other event broadcast on ITV4 which is the World Grand Prix in March. He also reached the final of the Champion of Champions last year and most recently the Shanghai Masters where he lost to his first round opponent on Tuesday, Kyren Wilson. Trump looked back to form at the Bulgarian Open this weekend where he lost to Sam Baird in the quarter-finals. This of course came after a month away from snooker, failing to qualify for the International Championships in Daqing, losing his Last 128 match 6-0 Michael Wild and shortly after that he lost in the first round of the Ruhr Open 4-3 to Hammad Miah. However, he loves the events like the Champion of Champions, being able to play in front of a big crowd. With Ronnie O'Sullivan absent, Judd is not only the favourite for the title this week but he is also probably the person that will get the most attention as long as he is in the event. I don't see Trump's group draw as the hardest possible one to get through and he will expect to get through to at least the semi-finals on Saturday.
Group Prediction: Trump to beat Wilson 4-2, Bingham to win 4-3 before Trump wins the Group final 6-2.
Group Two (Friday 13th November)
Draw:Mark Selby Vs Stephen Maguire
Barry Hawkins Vs Mark Allen
If you think back far enough, you'll be able to remember the last time you saw Stephen Maguire in action. That would of course be at the Ruhr Open a full month ago, where he was knocked out in the Last 32. That result is part of a poor trend that Maguire has suffered this year. He was beaten in the International Championship Last 128 round comfortably by Noppon Saengkham following another comfortable loss 5-1 to Michael Holt in the Shanghai Masters. In the three European Tour events he has played this season he hasn't managed to get past the Last 32 stages. This is kind of ironic given that his reason for being in Coventry is a European Tour win at the Lisbon Open in December. With his lack of form and his first round opponent Mark Selby in pretty good form of late, Stephen is probably going to have his work cut out for him once again on Friday afternoon.
Mark Allen was a last ditch entry into the Champion of Champions after winning the final qualifying event which was this weekends Bulgarian Open. With that in mind he's obviously in good form coming into the event and is one of the main men to watch but he has an equally tough first round opponent in Barry Hawkins. Barry has beaten Mark in all of their last three major meetings and that doesn't bode particularly well for Allen. He has been playing well for a while now and I feel like he is stepping ever closer towards winning a really major title, so with the UK Championship to come after this now is a great time to find form for him and he has already appeared in Last 16's at two of the other three European Tour events as well as the International Championship quarter-finals and the semi-finals of the Shanghai Masters. It's going to be a very tough match on Friday against Barry and it could go all the way to a final frame.
Barry Hawkins makes it into the Champion of Champions courtesy of his victory in the seasons first European Tour event in Riga where he beat Tom Ford in the final as well as Michael White and Graeme Dott on the way. However, since that victory fortunes have been a little bit mixed for Barry. In the other two European Tour events (missing the weekends Bulgarian Open in the lead up to this) he had a Last 64 at the Paul Hunter Classic, but did make the quarter-final in Mulheim before losing to David Gilbert. However, his performances in the bigger events have been slightly more worrying with Last 32 exits in the Shanghai Masters and International Championship. I expect Hawkins to play bright snooker, but equally I do not see him making up part of the semi-final line-up on Saturday.
Mark Selby is in good form coming into this event, making it in through his German Masters victory in February and China Open win in April, but he's starting to come back into a little bit of form very recently too. At the International Championship he made it all the way to the semi-finals before losing to the rampant John Higgins where there was very little he could do. In the Ruhr Open he lost out in a tight deciding frame in the Last 16 and he could easily have gone on to win the event that week. Just this weekend at the Bulgarian Open he made the quarter-finals, but again there was little he could do to stop Ryan Day who was on top break building form there. Mark's Coventry record isn't too bad with one quarter-final and one semi-final and living so close to the venue he will enjoy the ability to play a tournament from home and not spend all of his time away from the family and the comforts of his own bed which may make a positive difference to his snooker.
Group Prediction: Selby to see off Maguire 4-2, Hawkins to beat Allen 4-3 and Selby to win the Group Final 6-3.
Predicted Tournament Runner-Up: Shaun Murphy
Predicted Tournament Winner: Judd Trump
With a very good mix in the line-up and one that for the first time actually consists of 16 guys that have won an event in the last year (believe it or not) it's going to be an enthralling six days of snooker at the Ricoh Arena as the season continues to hot up in this, the last event before the UK Championships in York starting on Tuesday 24th November, with the BBC's 9 day TV coverage beginning on Saturday 28th November. That means a big period of snooker in the British Isles and covered on Terrestrial Television is all set to begin from this week onwards and all of it will be covered in full on this blog so keep on the look out.
No comments:
Post a Comment