World Snooker Championships 2020

...and this is why pool will never be snooker. Rare to see a pool player call a foul on himself. Most defend the cheater by stating it's the ref's responsibility to call fouls, but that's just a sad excuse to gain an undeserving upper hand imo.

I disagree and have the opposite experiences. Have seen tons of players call fouls on themselves, me included. You must play with a-holes.

Pool will never be snooker, that i agree with ... it is what it is.
 
Free ball is when a color takes the place of a red when you are
Accidentally hidden from seeing any red. Removes some “bad” luck.
 
You must play with a-holes.

I don't play on the professional circuit, so no, these aren't the particular a-holes I play with. Tons of examples on YT. Dennis O. with his ever rotating racking skills until he starts potting one off the break, and double hits by Shane V.B. or his ridiculous back end lose racks jump to mind.
 
Under the "free ball" rule, if your opponent commits any foul, and you are snookered on every legal target ball (usually all reds) you may declare any ball on the table to be on for that shot. For example, if your opponent goes in-off (scratches) and the only red left on the table down behind the black, you may declare the brown ball to be a red, shoot it in for one point since it was temporarily a red ball, and then play the blue as your color.

There have been a few games with "16 reds" when a foul left the other player snookered on a full table. There has been a break of 148 in a pro event.

If you are playing a free ball, you are not permitted to just roll up behind it for a safety. Otherwise in the scenario above you could just roll up behind the red brown ball and leave your opponent doubly snookered on the real red behind the black.

Being snookered has a very precise definition. It means that there is no "ball on" (legally playable) that you can hit both sides of due to a ball or balls in the way. However, reds cannot snooker you on reds. On the opening break, you are not snookered on the reds because if you removed all but the corner reds you could hit both edges of them. You cannot be snookered by the jaw of the pocket.

There was a shot in the current championships in which the ref got an extra ball to put up against the ball that needed to be struck to see if there was a direct path to that edge from where the cue ball was. I believe it was declared a snooker and Ronnie got a free ball. IIRC.
 
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and now he's bogged down. the leister anaconda is at work.. i predict next session to be one with reds scattered up table a lot, selby style.. i think ronnie is toast

You may be right. Ronnie has last 2 meetings vs Selby in World Championship. Lost 2014 final and 2010 quarterfinal. In both those matches, once Selby took lead he never gave it up. :mad:


Judd Trump may be onto something when he said Kyren Wilsen may snap this off. Whoever wins this semi may be drained out and Wilson upset them in final :D

2010wc.JPG

2014final.JPG
 
Fans will be allowed in the final. Only maximum 300 audience
https://www.bbc.com/sport/snooker/53771656


Under the "free ball" rule, if your opponent commits any foul, and you are snookered on every legal target ball (usually all reds) you may declare any ball on the table to be on for that shot. For example, if your opponent goes in-off (scratches) and the only red left on the table down behind the black, you may declare the brown ball to be a red, shoot it in for one point since it was temporarily a red ball, and then play the blue as your color.

There have been a few games with "16 reds" when a foul left the other player snookered on a full table. There has been a break of 148 in a pro event.

If you are playing a free ball, you are not permitted to just roll up behind it for a safety. Otherwise in the scenario above you could just roll up behind the red brown ball and leave your opponent doubly snookered on the real red behind the black.

Being snookered has a very precise definition. It means that there is no "ball on" (legally playable) that you can hit both sides of due to a ball or balls in the way. However, reds cannot snooker you on reds. On the opening break, you are not snookered on the reds because if you removed all but the corner reds you could hit both edges of them. You cannot be snookered by the jaw of the pocket.

There was a shot in the current championships in which the ref got an extra ball to put up against the ball that needed to be struck to see if there was a direct path to that edge from where the cue ball was. I believe it was declared a snooker and Ronnie got a free ball. IIRC.

Snooker has these bizarre rules that need rocket scientist (not Ronnie) to interpret :D
In frame 14, Ronnie played cue ball to touch pack of reds and both players agreed to rerack. Hendry mentioned that it is better now cos in past the rule was both players had to play 3 shots each before rerack
https://youtu.be/lJHwagp5qns?t=6681
 
Judd is cheering on Wilson.

If Selby wins, he doesn’t catch Trump in the rankings. However, next year the 500 ranking points from The 2019 Crucible come off his total and Selby could pass him..
 
Under the "free ball" rule, if your opponent commits any foul, and you are snookered on every legal target ball (usually all reds) you may declare any ball on the table to be on for that shot. For example, if your opponent goes in-off (scratches) and the only red left on the table down behind the black, you may declare the brown ball to be a red, shoot it in for one point since it was temporarily a red ball, and then play the blue as your color.

There have been a few games with "16 reds" when a foul left the other player snookered on a full table. There has been a break of 148 in a pro event.

If you are playing a free ball, you are not permitted to just roll up behind it for a safety. Otherwise in the scenario above you could just roll up behind the red brown ball and leave your opponent doubly snookered on the real red behind the black.

Being snookered has a very precise definition. It means that there is no "ball on" (legally playable) that you can hit both sides of due to a ball or balls in the way. However, reds cannot snooker you on reds. On the opening break, you are not snookered on the reds because if you removed all but the corner reds you could hit both edges of them. You cannot be snookered by the jaw of the pocket.

There was a shot in the current championships in which the ref got an extra ball to put up against the ball that needed to be struck to see if there was a direct path to that edge from where the cue ball was. I believe it was declared a snooker and Ronnie got a free ball. IIRC.

Very interesting post. This is a rule I never understood before. I never learned all the rules of snooker like I did at pool.
 
There was a shot in the current championships in which the ref got an extra ball
to put up against the ball that needed to be struck to see if there was a direct path to that edge from where the cue ball was. I believe it was declared a snooker and Ronnie got a free ball. IIRC.

This occurred on final frame/rack in Mark Williams vs. Ronnie O'Sullilvan match. Really close free ball call. Mark stated later on Twitter that he trusted and respected the referee and thus his judgment.

In this frame, Mark also called a foul on himself (for touching another ball with the cue during pre-stroke) that no-one else (referee, TV commentator) saw - great and honest sportsmanship, especially given the circumstance.

This was a crazy frame that ended in tie score with Ronnie winning the frame and the match in re-spotted black.
 
... Snooker has these bizarre rules that need rocket scientist (not Ronnie) to interpret :D
In frame 14, Ronnie played cue ball to touch pack of reds and both players agreed to rerack. Hendry mentioned that it is better now cos in past the rule was both players had to play 3 shots each before rerack
https://youtu.be/lJHwagp5qns?t=6681
I believe the previous rule actually was that the players were warned and if no progress was made in three shots after the warning, there would be a rerack. That way no one -- for example the player who is ahead on the score -- is surprised by the rerack. A rerack sets the score to zero.

The current rule actually has a "three more turns after a discussion" clause which is invoked if either player objects to an immediate rerack, but if the players agree to a rerack they can have one immediately. The number of additional turns is at the referee's discretion.

It's not rocket science, but there are many ifs, thens, unlesses, and buts. The foul-and-a-miss rule has 17 sections.

Here are the official rules of the Championhship. They changed in 2019. https://wpbsa.com/rules/
 
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Like call shot call safe ten ball,
It’s an attempt to reduce luck.

Anyone COULD win from here,
I would say kyren looks the best.
And he was runner up to judd in
The last tournament early 2020
 
This is why you need to subscribe to DAZN (Da Zone). $100/yr. Snooker World Championships, Mosconi Cup, and US Open 9-ball from Matchroom. Plus all the rest of their offerings. ...
I signed up for a month due to the general uncertainty around everything.

It was hard to see on their site that they covered snooker. Maybe I was looking in the wrong place. Now that I have an account, it keeps me logged in and I can see the schedule and connect to the streams fairly easily.

The stream has been fine. They streamed both tables and there are two sets of commentators.

My main complaint is that the stream is not available in the archive or at least I have not been able to find it. You can go back in the stream and see an earlier match for the day, but the whole stream for the day disappears not long after the day's broadcast ends.

If anyone knows how to find the matches in an archive there, I'd sure like to know.
 
I signed up for a month due to the general uncertainty around everything.

It was hard to see on their site that they covered snooker. Maybe I was looking in the wrong place. Now that I have an account, it keeps me logged in and I can see the schedule and connect to the streams fairly easily.

The stream has been fine. They streamed both tables and there are two sets of commentators.

My main complaint is that the stream is not available in the archive or at least I have not been able to find it. You can go back in the stream and see an earlier match for the day, but the whole stream for the day disappears not long after the day's broadcast ends.

If anyone knows how to find the matches in an archive there, I'd sure like to know.
The usual youtube search will spoil you with choices-

https://youtu.be/VAgbXMeXeDY
 
Watching the semis, I don`t know if there has ever been a player who can get into another players head like Selby can do.
I mean Trump and Ronnie can devastate an opponent by simply overrun them, but Selby`s playing style is on a completely different level.
This slow grinding frames, followed by frame winning 70+ breaks are completely breaking the rhythm of every player.

I can`t see Ronnie coming back in this match, his potting is way off and he hasn`t the patience to play and win one scrappy frame after another.
 
Watching the semis, I don`t know if there has ever been a player who can get into another players head like Selby can do.
I mean Trump and Ronnie can devastate an opponent by simply overrun them, but Selby`s playing style is on a completely different level.
This slow grinding frames, followed by frame winning 70+ breaks are completely breaking the rhythm of every player.

I can`t see Ronnie coming back in this match, his potting is way off and he hasn`t the patience to play and win one scrappy frame after another.

it's weird isn't it? he is perfectly polite, honest, well-mannered.. average shot time isn't excessively high, he has made lots of centuries in his career. he even has a cinderella background, rags-to-riches. still i can't root for him, against anyone.

he makes frames weird, scrappy and he plays the long game psychologically. take the second frame of this session. he could never win from there, but wouldn't concede. it wasn't about that frame, he just wanted to set the tone early on, wear out his opponent a little. that's the long game and i've seen him do it so often and in many ways
 
Judd Trump may be onto something when he said Kyren Wilsen may snap this off. Whoever wins this semi may be drained out and Wilson upset them in final :D


If Kyren/Mcgill goes the distance, the most frames they can play is 10.

If Ronnie/Selby goes the distance, the most frames they can play is 17.


So I see Trump's point about the winner of this match being drained. Were the semi's always split up like this?

I'd be curious to know how often the winner of the event was from the match that had to play the fewer number of frames the day before the finals started.
 
it's weird isn't it? he is perfectly polite, honest, well-mannered.. average shot time isn't excessively high, he has made lots of centuries in his career. he even has a cinderella background, rags-to-riches. still i can't root for him, against anyone.

he makes frames weird, scrappy and he plays the long game psychologically. take the second frame of this session. he could never win from there, but wouldn't concede. it wasn't about that frame, he just wanted to set the tone early on, wear out his opponent a little. that's the long game and i've seen him do it so often and in many ways

I would root for him if he has to play McGill.
 
If anyone knows how to find the matches in an archive there, I'd sure like to know.
The first day I was watching a couple of hours after the match. The replay stopped and a message came up stating that the license for this content has expired.
 
Ronnie struggling, long pots game deserted him yet he somehow tie the session and trails the session just 2 frames 11-13. Incredible. I think Selby gifted him 3 frames missing relatively easy pots. Key frame was frame 23 when Selby looked like on course for 5 frame lead but Ronnie won that and next to still be in contention.
Good thing is Ronnie played badly and still tied the session and he can only play better in final session 6 hours from now. Selby on other hand would be kicking himself since he would have won the match if he had 5 frames lead this session.


it's weird isn't it? he is perfectly polite, honest, well-mannered.. average shot time isn't excessively high, he has made lots of centuries in his career. he even has a cinderella background, rags-to-riches. still i can't root for him, against anyone.

he makes frames weird, scrappy and he plays the long game psychologically. take the second frame of this session. he could never win from there, but wouldn't concede. it wasn't about that frame, he just wanted to set the tone early on, wear out his opponent a little. that's the long game and i've seen him do it so often and in many ways

It’s called Negative play and Selby is Mr Negative of snooker. Never liked him. I think 2 frames this session Ronnie winning the frames and Selby need few snookers but Selby won’t concede and carrying on psy war to continue playing.
The rule should be changed to only allow play to continue if only 1 snooker required. If more than 1 snooker required, frame should be awarded to player leading :)


If Kyren/Mcgill goes the distance, the most frames they can play is 10.

If Ronnie/Selby goes the distance, the most frames they can play is 17.


So I see Trump's point about the winner of this match being drained. Were the semi's always split up like this?

I'd be curious to know how often the winner of the event was from the match that had to play the fewer number of frames the day before the finals started.

I think they split based on luck of draw . 3 sessions yesterday and today so either semifinal play 2 sessions yesterday or today. Maybe they shoiuld
have 1 day break before final or spread the semis over 4 days (instead 3) and have only 1 morning session day before final
 
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