It's time for day 2 of my moment of the month countdown which is all building towards my big reveal of the Moment of 2014 on 2nd January. Today we go back to February to have a look back on Shaun Murphy's win at the Gdynia Open with a 147 on the same day. What a moment it was!!!
This moment came on Sunday 9th February when Shaun Murphy managed to win his first tournament since the 2011 Brazil Masters and his first event of any kind of ranking importance (this being a minor-ranking event) since the 2011 PTC Grand Finals. This win also secured that Shaun would be at the PTC Grand Finals for the first time since he won it back then. This moment was incredibly special to Shaun Murphy because he'd been working so hard over the season to this point, without anything to really show for it in terms of victories or even a good tournament. Despite making the Masters semi-finals he was incredibly upset with his performance and suggested that his time of winning tournaments was done and that he may have to look for something else as well as snooker. So to then come into this event with low expectations, and win it with some really really good snooker was amazing for him and this probably meant as much as any of his 4 full ranking titles.
He came into the final day, having played his opening 3 matches to get to the Last 16 on the Friday, with good wins against Jamie O'Neill, Stuart Bingham (making 2 total clearances to go 2-0 up in that match) and Tian Pengfei. He'd played well on that day, and with some big names not entering this event, and a few others getting knocked out early, or showing generally poorer form, I really fancied Shaun's chances of winning the whole thing going into the Sunday.
He started off on an outside table against Jamie Jones, quickly going 2-0 up in that match, before being pegged back to 2-2 after 2 good breaks from Jones. Jamie led by 38 points early in the 5th after a break of 49, but Shaun Murphy hit back with a 48 clearance to move 3-2 up. Shaun then produced the first magic moment of the day to win the match 4-2, knocking in his 2nd 147 within a month (having made one in January at group 2 of the Championship League) and then exchanging high fives with the crowd, and presenting his 147 chalk to a young fan.
As tense as things became for Shaun was in the quarter-final as he took up residence on the Televised table, this time for a match with Stephen Maguire. After the first frame could've gone either way, but eventually went the way of the Scot, Murphy won the next 2 to go 2-1 in front with a high break of 51. Maguire levelled again with a break of 98 before a 42 and a 37 in the next put Stephen one from victory at 3-2. Murphy's response was to make the first century of the match, a superb break of 128 to force a decider. The decider was very scrappy and tense, but an early break of 43 from Shaun eventually turned into enough to win the match 4-3 and move into the semi-finals.
Possibly the best match of the week for Shaun was his match against Matthew Selt, as his cue ball control throughout the match was immaculate and his long pot was excellent as it had been all week. Nice breaks of 95 and 79 put Murphy into a very quick 2-0 lead, before a good break of Selt's own (a 71) got him back into the match at 2-1. He wasn't back into it for long though with runs of 54 and 77 putting Shaun into the final with a 4-1 win.
In the final he met a very tough opponent in Ireland's Fergal O'Brien and the first frame of the match was very scrappy, and lent itself more to Fergal's slower tactical style than Shaun's style, and particularly the attacking style that had come off for him so well this week. However, with terrific pots on the brown and blue, Murphy put himself 1-0 in front in the Gdynia Open final, before breaks of 75, 65 and 63 put Murphy 3-0 ahead of O'Brien who'd only had the odd chance himself, but was still 1 frame from defeat. Fergal kept on fighting though, and needed 3 chances to win the 4th frame, which he eventually did to keep in it at 1-3. Shaun Murphy finished off though in true champions style with yet another century, a 103 this time to win the match 4-1 and take the 2014 Gdynia Open title.
After the match, Shaun was very complimentary about Fergal O'Brien, saying that he always gives 100% on every shot and that he is a role model for all young snooker players. He also thanked his manager, coach Chris Henry and all of his family for being there through tough times on the table, and for keeping him going. It was really great to see Shaun Murphy win the title though, and I for one will say that he truly deserved it for being a great ambassador for the sport, showing that lots of hard work on and off of the table does eventually come good.
Well done to Shaun Murphy there in February for that one, and be sure to come back tomorrow to find out what was my moment of the month for March.
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