With a short time to go until the start of this years Champion of Champions event in Coventry after a weekend of action in Bulgaria, there's a little bit of time to have a look at some of the important statistics and fun facts on the 16 players competing and looking back and the two previous MODERN editions of this competition. (I'm obviously not taking the 1980 and 1978 editions into account as incidentally none of the players that featured in those will be playing this week)
Here are some things to ponder and enjoy ahead of the start on Tuesday:
First of all, Shaun Murphy has played in both of the first two editions of the event, but only managed to win three frames so far. In 2013 he lost 4-2 in the opening round to Mark Selby, while last year he lost 4-1 in a very poor match against Marco Fu. Shaun will certainly be hoping to break his Coventry curse on Thursday afternoon
John Higgins is yet another player never to have won in the Champion of Champions after playing in both of the first two. He lost 4-3 to Stephen Maguire in 2013 and Barry Hawkins overcame him in the Last 16 in 2014 4-1.
Mark Allen's recent win in the Bulgarian Open may have gotten him into the Champion of Champions, but he is another who is yet to get off the mark in this event losing 4-3 to Ali Carter in 2013 and in 2014 he was soundly beaten 4-0 by Ricky Walden. Barry Hawkins is his first round opponent this week.
Ronnie O'Sullivan won both of the first two runnings of this competition meaning that, after he turned down his place this year, we will have a different name on the trophy. Slightly more interestingly it means Stuart Bingham will be beaten by someone other than Ronnie, after losing to the Rocket in the 2013 final, and again in the first round in 2014 if indeed he doesn't win the event.
6 - This is the number of debutants in this years Champion of Champions. They are Shanghai Masters champion Kyren Wilson, World Cup winners Zhou Yuelong and Yan Bingtao, Joe Perry, Michael White and Ruhr Open champion Rory McLeod. The other 10 players in the competition will have featured in the draw for all 3 years.
Ali Carter has lost to Neil Robertson in both of the two editions of this competition in another case of serial meetings in the 2013 quarter's 6-5 and 4-0 in the 2014 Last 16. However, the pair will only meet this year if they both get to Sunday's final such is their separation in the draw.
Luckily for Barry Hawkins, Ding Junhui has failed to qualify for this years Champion of Champions after his Asian Tour victory last month wasn't enough to make it through. This will relieve Hawkins who would've played Ding Junhui if it wasn't for Mark Allen's win at the Bulgarian Open, having lost to Ding in both of the 2013 and 2014 Champion of Champions events.
If you think that Neil Robertson's group on Thursday is tough, playing Rory McLeod in round one and possibly Murphy or Bingtao if he gets through, it is worth noting that he is the only other player after O'Sullivan to make at least the semi-finals in both years.
To give you an idea of how many centuries to expect in Coventry, both the 2013 and 2014 editions yielded a similar number, with 21 in 2013 and 20 in 2014. So around the 20 number you'd guess is where the 2015 tally will weigh in also.
The matches in the Champion of Champions have usually been close as you'd expect between the tournament winners of the last couple of years. Both finals have been won with no more than three frames in the scores. Meanwhile the 4 best-of-11 semi-finals to have been played finished with 1 decider 6-5, and three 6-4 score lines.
Neil Robertson and Rory McLeod have three previous meetings, and Robertson has won all of those three meetings in a best-of-17, a best-of-9 and a best-of-7 by only losing two frames combined.
Excluding the 6 Reds World Championship and Championship League, the last three meetings between Mark Selby and Stephen Maguire have seen three wins for Selby in the 2015 German Masters semi-finals, the 2013 Champion of Champions quarter-final and the quarter-finals of the 2012 Welsh Open.
Excluding minor events, Barry Hawkins has won his last three meetings with Mark Allen, 4-1 just a month ago at the Ruhr Open, 13-11 in the World Championships this year, and the other 5-1 in the 2013 German Masters. On all of these occasions the meetings occurred at the Last 16 stage of the given tournament, which of course is the round in which they meet this week as well.
As I say with both little time to prepare I hope I've picked out some interesting stats and facts there and of course there hasn't been a large amount of history to this 16 man event with only two previous editions. Again, this should be a nice accompaniment to my main Champion of Champions Preview so I hope you all enjoy.
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