Portal:Cue_sports
Portal:Cue sports
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The Cue Sports Portal
Cue sports are a wide variety of games of skill played with a cue, which is used to strike billiard balls and thereby cause them to move around a cloth-covered table bounded by elastic bumpers known as cushions. Cue sports are also collectively referred to as billiards, though this term has more specific connotations in some varieties of English.
There are three major subdivisions of games within cue sports:
- Carom billiards, played on tables without pockets, typically ten feet in length, including straight rail, balkline, one-cushion carom, three-cushion billiards, artistic billiards, and four-ball
- Pocket billiards (or pool), played on six-pocket tables of seven, eight, nine, or ten-foot length, including among others eight-ball (the world's most widely played cue sport), nine-ball (the dominant professional game), ten-ball, straight pool (the formerly dominant pro game), one-pocket, and bank pool
- Snooker, English billiards, and Russian pyramid, played on a large, six-pocket table (dimensions just under 12 ft by 6 ft), all of which are classified separately from pool based on distinct development histories, player culture, rules, and terminology.
Billiards has a long history from its inception in the 15th century, with many mentions in the works of Shakespeare, including the line "let's to billiards" in Antony and Cleopatra (1606–07). Enthusiasts of the sport have included Mozart, Louis XIV of France, Marie Antoinette, Immanuel Kant, Napoleon, Abraham Lincoln, Mark Twain, George Washington, Jules Grévy, Charles Dickens, George Armstrong Custer, Theodore Roosevelt, Lewis Carroll, W. C. Fields, Babe Ruth, Bob Hope, and Jackie Gleason. (Full article...)
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- Image 1The 1989 World Snooker Championship (also referred to as the Embassy World Snooker Championship for sponsorship reasons) was a professional snooker tournament that took place from 15 April to 1 May 1989 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. Organised by the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association, it was the eighth and final ranking event of the 1988–89 snooker season and the thirteenth consecutive World Snooker Championship to be held at the Crucible, the first tournament at this location having taken place in 1977. There were 142 entrants to the competition.
The defending champion was Steve Davis, who had previously won the World Championship five times. He met John Parrott in the final, which was a best-of-35-frames match. Davis won the match 18–3, which remains the biggest winning margin in the sport's modern era, and meant that the final, scheduled for four sessions, finished with a session to spare. This was Davis's sixth and last world title, and his last appearance in a World Championship final. Stephen Hendry scored the championship's highest break, a 141, in his quarter-final match. There were 19 century breaks compiled during the championship. (Full article...) - Image 2The 2021 World Snooker Championship (officially the 2021 Betfred World Snooker Championship) was a professional snooker tournament that took place from 17 April to 3 May 2021 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. It was the 45th consecutive year the World Snooker Championship was held at the Crucible Theatre and the 15th and final ranking event of the 2020–21 snooker season. It was organised by the World Snooker Tour. The event was sponsored by sports betting company Betfred and broadcast by the BBC, Eurosport and Matchroom Sport. It featured a total prize fund of £2,395,000 of which the winner received £500,000.
Qualifying for the tournament took place between 5 and 14 April 2021 at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield. There were 128 participants in the qualifying rounds, consisting of a mix of professional and invited amateur players. The main stage of the tournament featured 32 players: the top 16 players from the snooker world rankings and an additional 16 players from the qualifying rounds. Ronnie O'Sullivan was the defending champion, having won his sixth world title at the previous year's event, where he defeated Kyren Wilson 18–8 in the final. O'Sullivan lost in the second round to Anthony McGill 12–13. Mark Selby defeated Shaun Murphy 18–15 in the final to win his fourth world title and the 20th ranking title of his career. There were a record 108 century breaks made at the Crucible, with an additional 106 made in qualifying rounds. The tournament's highest break was 144 by Murphy in the second round. (Full article...) - Image 3
The sport of snooker has utilised a world rankings system since 1975, used to seed players on the World Snooker Tour for tournaments. Originally rankings were published once a year, at the culmination of the season, however, since 2010, the rankings have been changed to be updated after every ranking tournament. The number one rank has been held by eleven players; Ray Reardon was the first to hold the position, and was followed by Cliff Thorburn, Steve Davis, Stephen Hendry, John Higgins, Mark Williams, Ronnie O'Sullivan, Neil Robertson, Mark Selby, Judd Trump and Ding Junhui.
Hendry held the number one position for the longest time under the annual format, holding it for nine years in total. Since it changed to a rolling format in 2010, Selby has held the rank longer than anyone else. (Full article...) - Image 4
The 2019 World Snooker Championship (officially the 2019 Betfred World Snooker Championship) was a professional snooker tournament that took place from 20 April to 6 May 2019 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. It was the 43rd consecutive year the World Snooker Championship had been held at the Crucible, and the 20th and final ranking event of the 2018–19 snooker season. Qualifying for the tournament took place from 10 to 17 April 2019 at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield. Sports betting company Betfred sponsored the event.
The winner of the title was Judd Trump, who defeated John Higgins 18–9 in the final to claim his first World Championship. In doing so, Trump became the 11th player to win all three Triple Crown titles at least once. Defending champion Mark Williams lost 9–13 to David Gilbert in the second round of the tournament. For the first time in the history of the World Snooker Championship, an amateur player appeared at the main stage of the event—debutant James Cahill defeated world number one Ronnie O'Sullivan in the first round, before being narrowly defeated by Stephen Maguire in a second round deciding frame. (Full article...) - Image 5
The 2018 World Snooker Championship (officially the 2018 Betfred World Snooker Championship) was a professional snooker tournament held from 21 April to 7 May 2018 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. Hosted by the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association, it was the 20th and final ranking event of the 2017–18 snooker season and the 42nd consecutive time the World Snooker Championship had been held at the venue. The tournament was broadcast by BBC Sport and Eurosport in Europe, and sponsored by betting company Betfred.
Welsh left-hander Mark Williams won his third world championship and 21st ranking title, defeating Scottish professional John Higgins 18–16 in the final. Williams' victory came 15 years after his second world title in 2003; before the start of the season, he had not won a ranking event in the previous six years. In winning the event, Williams received the highest prize money awarded for a snooker event, £425,000 of a total pool of £1,968,000. Aged 43, he was the third oldest winner at the crucible after Ronnie O'Sullivan who was 44 when he won the 2020 World Snooker Championship and Ray Reardon who was 45 when he won the title in 1978. Defending and three-time world champion Mark Selby had won the world title for the previous two years, but lost in the first round 4–10 to Joe Perry. (Full article...) - Image 6
The 2015 World Snooker Championship (officially the 2015 Betfred World Snooker Championship) was a professional snooker tournament which took place from 18 April to 4 May 2015 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. It was the 39th consecutive year that the World Snooker Championship had been held at the Crucible, and was the final ranking event of the 2014–15 snooker season. Sports betting company Betfred sponsored the event for the first time in three years, having previously done so from 2009 to 2012. The top sixteen players in the snooker world rankings were placed into the draw, and another sixteen players qualified for the event at a tournament taking place from 8 to 15 April 2015 at the Ponds Forge International Sports Centre, Sheffield.
Mark Selby was the defending champion, having defeated Ronnie O'Sullivan in the 2014 final. Selby lost 9–13 in the second round to event debutant Anthony McGill, and became the 16th first-time champion unable to defend his title at the venue. Shaun Murphy, the 2005 winner, met Stuart Bingham in the final. Bingham, who was given odds of 50–1 to win the tournament by bookmakers before the start of the tournament, defeated Murphy 18–15 in the final to win the first world title of his 20-year professional career. Aged 38, Bingham became the oldest player to win the title since Ray Reardon in 1978. (Full article...) - Image 7The 2019 Champion of Champions (officially the 2019 ManBetX Champion of Champions) was a professional snooker tournament that took place between 4 and 10 November 2019 at the Ricoh Arena in Coventry, England. It was the ninth Champion of Champions event, the first of which was held in 1978. The tournament featured 16 participants who had won World Snooker events throughout the prior snooker season. In 2019, the Women's World Champion competed at the tournament for the first time. As an invitational event, the Champion of Champions tournament carried no world ranking points.
Ronnie O'Sullivan was the defending champion having defeated Kyren Wilson 10–9 in the final of the 2018 event. O'Sullivan lost 5–6 to Neil Robertson in the semi-finals. Robertson defeated reigning world champion Judd Trump 10–9 in the final to win the championship, having required foul shots in the penultimate frame to avoid losing the match. There were 20 century breaks during the tournament, eight of which were made in the final. Mark Allen compiled the highest break of the tournament, a 140, in his semi-final loss to Trump. The tournament's total prize fund was £440,000, the winner receiving £150,000. (Full article...) - Image 8
The 2020 Masters (officially the 2020 Dafabet Masters) was a professional non-ranking snooker tournament that took place at Alexandra Palace in London, England, from 12 to 19 January 2020. It was the 46th staging of the Masters tournament, which was first held in 1975, and the second of three Triple Crown events in the 2019–20 season, following the 2019 UK Championship and preceding the 2020 World Snooker Championship. The event invites the top sixteen players from the snooker world rankings in a knockout tournament. It was organised by the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association and was broadcast by the BBC and Eurosport in Europe.
Judd Trump was the defending champion, having defeated Ronnie O'Sullivan 10–4 in the final of the previous year's event. Trump lost to Shaun Murphy 3–6 in the first round. O'Sullivan was eligible to compete, but chose not to participate, so his entry was given to Ali Carter, next on the world ranking list. Carter reached the final, where he played Stuart Bingham; recovering from 5–7 behind, Bingham won the final 10–8 to claim his first Masters title. He became the oldest Masters champion at the age of 43 years and 243 days, beating the previous record set by Ray Reardon in 1976; Bingham remained the tournament's oldest winner until 2024, when O'Sullivan won the title aged 48 years and 40 days. (Full article...) - Image 9
Snooker (pronounced UK: /ˈsnuːkər/ SNOO-kər, US: /ˈsnʊkər/ SNUUK-ər) is a cue sport played on a rectangular billiards table covered with a green cloth called baize, with six pockets, one at each corner and one in the middle of each long side. First played by British Army officers stationed in India in the second half of the 19th century, the game is played with twenty-two balls, comprising a white cue ball, fifteen red balls, and six other balls—a yellow, green, brown, blue, pink, and black—collectively called the colours. Using a cue stick, the individual players or teams take turns to strike the cue ball to pot other balls in a predefined sequence, accumulating points for each successful pot and for each time the opposing player or team commits a foul. An individual frame of snooker is won by the player who has scored the most points. A snooker match ends when a player reaches a predetermined number of frames.
In 1875, army officer Neville Chamberlain, stationed in Ootacamund, Madras, and Jabalpur, devised a set of rules that combined black pool and pyramids. The word snooker was a well-established derogatory term used to describe inexperienced or first-year military personnel. In the early 20th century, snooker was predominantly played in the United Kingdom where it was considered a "gentleman's sport" until the early 1960s, before growing in popularity as a national pastime and eventually spreading overseas. The standard rules of the game were first established in 1919 when the Billiards Association and Control Club was formed. As a professional sport, snooker is now governed by the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association. (Full article...) - Image 10The 2021 Masters (officially the 2021 Betfred Masters) was a professional non-ranking snooker tournament that took place between 10 and 17 January 2021 at the Marshall Arena in Milton Keynes, England. It was the 47th staging of the Masters tournament, which was first held in 1975, and the second of three Triple Crown events in the 2020–21 season, following the 2020 UK Championship and preceding the 2021 World Snooker Championship. The top sixteen players from the snooker world rankings were invited to compete in a knockout tournament. The World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association organised the tournament, which was broadcast by the BBC and Eurosport in Europe. The event was sponsored by sports betting company Betfred. It was played behind closed doors because of COVID-19 restrictions in the United Kingdom. Two players, world number one Judd Trump and Jack Lisowski, withdrew from the event after testing positive for COVID-19.
The defending champion, Stuart Bingham, had defeated Ali Carter 10–8 in the previous year's final. Bingham lost 6–5 to Yan Bingtao in the semi-finals. Yan (one of three debutants at the event, alongside Thepchaiya Un-Nooh and Gary Wilson) met John Higgins in the final. Yan completed a 10–8 victory to win his first Triple Crown tournament. As the winner of the event, Yan was awarded £250,000 from the total prize pool of £725,000. The highest break of the event was a 145 made by Higgins in his quarter-final win over Ronnie O'Sullivan which earned him £15,000. (Full article...)
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Graeme Dott (born 12 May 1977) is a Scottish professional snooker player and snooker coach from Larkhall. He turned professional in 1994 and first entered the top 16 in 2001. He has won two ranking titles, the 2006 World Snooker Championship and the 2007 China Open, and was runner-up in the World Championships of 2004 and 2010. He reached number 2 in the world rankings in 2007, but a subsequent episode of clinical depression seriously affected his form, causing him to drop to number 28 for the 2009–10 season. He then recovered his form, regained his top-16 ranking, and reached a third World Championship final. In 2011, he published his autobiography, Frame of Mind: The Autobiography of the World Snooker Champion. (Full article...) - Image 2
William Frederick Hoppe (October 11, 1887 – February 1, 1959) (surname rhymes with "poppy"), was an internationally renowned American professional carom billiards champion. Hoppe is widely considered one of the greatest billiards players of all time and was posthumously inducted into the Billiard Congress of America Hall of Fame in 1966. (Full article...) - Image 3
Allen Hopkins (born November 18, 1951) is an American professional pocket billiards (pool) player, professional billiards color commentator and BCA Hall of Fame inductee. He promotes multiple annual pool events and still competes as a professional contender. (Full article...) - Image 4Ralph Greenleaf (November 3, 1899 – March 15, 1950) was an American professional pool and carom billiards player. Greenleaf is widely considered one of the greatest pool players of all time. Between the years 1919 and 1938, he won the World Straight Pool Championship nineteen times.
His obituary in The New York Times said of Greenleaf, in March 1950: "What Babe Ruth did for baseball, Dempsey did for fighting, Tilden did for tennis...Greenleaf did for pocket billiards."
The championships of his era were contested in the game of 14.1 continuous ("straight pool"), but varied in format from contest to contest and were not annual events. Championships were challenge matches between two players often played over several days to relatively high numbers (1,500 points for example). (Full article...) - Image 5William Joseph Mosconi (/mɒˈskoʊni/; June 27, 1913 – September 17, 1993) was an American professional pool player from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Mosconi is widely considered one of the greatest pool players of all time. Between the years of 1941 and 1957, he won the World Straight Pool Championship nineteen times. For most of the 20th century, his name was essentially synonymous with pool in North America – he was nicknamed "Mr. Pocket Billiards" – and he was among the first Billiard Congress of America Hall of Fame inductees. Mosconi pioneered and regularly employed numerous trick shots, set many records, and helped to popularize pool as a national recreation activity.
During the 1940s and 1950s, the pocket billiards game most often played in competition was called straight pool, or 14.1 continuous, a form of pool considered by most top players to be more difficult than today's fast tournament game nine-ball. Mosconi set the officially-recognized straight pool high run world record of 526 consecutive balls in 1954. (Full article...) - Image 6
Michael Sigel (born July 11, 1953) is an American professional pool player nicknamed "Captain Hook." He earned the nickname from his ability to hook his opponents with safety plays. Sigel was dominant during the 1980s in 9-Ball and Straight Pool and has a high run of 339 balls in Straight Pool. Mike Sigel is widely considered one of the greatest pool players of all time. In the year 2000, Sigel was voted "Greatest Living Player of the Century" by Billiards Digest Magazine. (Full article...) - Image 7Danny DiLiberto (born in Buffalo, New York) is an American retired professional pool player nicknamed "Buffalo Danny".
A veteran player from the Johnston City era, a teacher, an author, and previously working as a commentator for Accu-Stats, DiLiberto is an active member of the pocket billiards community. He was elected into the One Pocket Hall of Fame in 2004 for his "outstanding contribution to the legacy of the game of one pocket". (Full article...) - Image 8
Johnny Archer (born November 12, 1968, in Waycross, Georgia) is an American professional pool player. He is nicknamed "the Scorpion" (his zodiac sign is Scorpio, and one of his sponsors is Scorpion Cues). On June 8, 2009, Johnny Archer was nominated to be inducted into the Billiard Congress of America Hall of Fame. (Full article...) - Image 9Harold John Worst (1929 – June 16, 1966) was an American three-cushion billiards champion. He won the World Three-Cushion Championship four times, his first in Argentina in 1954, the youngest player to ever win the tournament, at the age of 24. Also he was equally skilled at pocket billiards and Worst dominated play to win the All-Around titles in both the 1965 Johnston City Championship and the 1965 Stardust Open championships. Two months before Worst died he competed in the 1966 World Straight Pool Championship, although severely ill he finished 4th. He was inducted into the Billiard Congress of America Hall of Fame in 1970.
He died in Blodgett Memorial Hospital in Grand Rapids, Michigan, of Lymphoma. He spent his life in
Grand Rapids and he was 37 years old when he died. (Full article...) - Image 10
Allister Carter (born 25 July 1979) is an English professional snooker player. He has twice been a World Championship finalist, in 2008 and 2012, losing both finals to Ronnie O'Sullivan. He has won five ranking titles and briefly reached number two in the world rankings in 2010. His nickname, "The Captain", comes from his hobby of piloting aeroplanes. (Full article...)
Did you know (auto-generated) - load new batch
- ... that both finalists at the 2008 World Snooker Championship made maximum breaks during the tournament?
- ... that John Spencer won a World Snooker Championship on his first attempt in 1969?
- ... that a snooker table used at the 2022 Turkish Masters was fixed with a car jack?
- ... that John Spencer "exploded two myths" by winning the 1977 World Snooker Championship with a two-piece cue that he had only been using for a couple of months?
- ... that the Highfield Cocoa and Coffee House in Sheffield, England, sold tea, coffee and cocoa at a penny a pint and also provided billiards and reading rooms?
- ... that the final of the 2009 IBSF women's snooker championship was interrupted so that drug tests could be conducted on the players?
- ... that Gary Wilson threw his snooker cue to the floor in anger at the 2022 UK Championship?
- ... that after winning the 2024 Masters, snooker player Ronnie O'Sullivan is both the youngest and oldest winner of the tournament?
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Shaun Peter Murphy (born 10 August 1982) is an English professional snooker player who won the 2005 World Championship. Nicknamed "The Magician", Murphy is noted for his straight cue action and his long potting.
Born in Harlow, Essex, and raised in Irthlingborough, Northamptonshire, Murphy turned professional in 1998. His 2005 victory at the World Championship was considered a major surprise as he was only the third qualifier to win the title after Alex Higgins and Terry Griffiths. Since then, he has been runner-up at the World Championship three times, in 2009, 2015, and 2021. Murphy has won twelve ranking titles, placing him tenth on the all time list of ranking tournament victories. He has also won eleven non-ranking tournaments, including the 2015 Masters, which completed his career Triple Crown. (Full article...) - Image 2
Ronald Antonio O'Sullivan OBE (born 5 December 1975) is an English professional snooker player, and current world number one. Widely recognised as one of the most talented and accomplished players in snooker history, he has won the World Snooker Championship seven times, a modern-era record he holds jointly with Stephen Hendry. He has also won a record eight Masters titles and a record eight UK Championship titles for a total of 23 Triple Crown titles, the most achieved by any player. He holds the record for the most ranking titles, with 41, and has held the top ranking position multiple times.
After winning amateur titles including the IBSF World Under-21 Snooker Championship, O'Sullivan turned professional in 1992, aged 16. He won his first ranking event at the 1993 UK Championship aged 17 years and 358 days, and remains the youngest player to win a ranking title. He is also the youngest player to win the Masters, having claimed his first title in 1995, aged 19 years and 69 days. Now also noted for his longevity in the sport, he is the oldest winner of all three Triple Crown events, having won his seventh world title in 2022, aged 46 years and 148 days; his eighth UK Championship title in 2023, aged 47 years and 363 days; and his eighth Masters title in 2024, aged 48 years and 40 days. As of 2024, he has made a record 32 appearances in the final stages of the World Snooker Championship at the Crucible, surpassing the previous record of 30 appearances set by Steve Davis. (Full article...) - Image 3
The 2018 UK Championship (officially the 2018 Betway UK Championship) was a professional ranking snooker tournament, that took place from 27 November to 9 December 2018. It was the ninth ranking tournament and the first Triple Crown event of the 2018/2019 season. The event was broadcast on BBC Sport and Eurosport in the United Kingdom.
Ronnie O'Sullivan, the defending champion, defeated Mark Allen 10–6 in the final, winning his 7th UK Championship and his 34th ranking event overall. In doing so, he became the first player since Stephen Hendry in 1996 to successfully defend the UK title. O'Sullivan broke Hendry's record for the most Triple Crown titles (18), Steve Davis's record of UK Championship titles (6) and became the second player to defend all Triple Crown tournaments at least once, after Hendry. The win was 25 years after his first UK Championship title as a 17 year old in 1993. (Full article...) - Image 4The 2019 Six-red World Championship (also known as the 2019 SangSom Six-red World Championship for sponsorship reasons) was a six-red snooker invitational tournament held between 2 and 7 September 2019 at the Bangkok Convention Center in Bangkok, Thailand. The event was the 2019 edition of the Six-red World Championship, first held in 2008. The event's final was contested by Scots Stephen Maguire and John Higgins who had won the 2019 World Cup doubles competition as a pair earlier in the season. Maguire won the event, defeating Higgins 8–6. The win was Maguire's first singles tournament victory since 2014.
Kyren Wilson won the previous year's event, but lost in the first knockout round to David Gilbert 4–6. The event saw a prize fund of 10,500,000 baht, with 4,000,000 baht awarded to the winner. Only one maximum break of 75 was made during the event, by Thepchaiya Un-Nooh. The event was sponsored by Thai rum producers SangSom. (Full article...) - Image 5Ina Kaplan (née Jentschura; born 14 May 1987) is a German professional pool player. She is an eleven-time German national champion and is the second female player (after Franziska Stark) to win three of four disciplines in one event at the championships.
In 2010, Kaplan reached the final of the European Pool Championships in ten-ball, finishing as runner-up behind Jasmin Ouschan. In the Women's Euro Tour, Kaplan won events in 2013, 2014, and 2017 and finished three times as a runner-up. Kaplan is third on the all-time list of winners in the tour, behind Ouschan and Kristina Tkach with a total of 12 medals from the events. Kaplan also promotes pool events, usually women's events. She is married to fellow German pool player Jörn Kaplan. They share a professional pool club, where she was the first woman to play in the highest tier of German club pool, the 1st Bundesliga [de]. (Full article...) - Image 6
Kelly pool (also known as pea pool, pill pool, keeley, the keilley game, and killy) is a pool game played on a standard pool table using a standard set of 16 pool balls. Gameplay involves players each drawing one of 16 numbered markers called peas or pills at random from a shake bottle, which assigns to them the correspondingly numbered pool ball, kept secret from their opponents, but which they must pocket to win the game. Kelly pool is a rotation game, which means that players must contact the lowest numbered object ball on each shot first until the opportunity to pocket their own is presented. If a player draws the number 16, this player is assigned the cue ball. In order to pocket the cue ball, the player must contact the lowest ball first and in the same shot, pocket the cue ball. However, the game is commonly played by removing the pea numbered 16 and playing with the basic 15 numbered balls and corresponding peas. Two rule variants are set forth under rules promulgated by the Billiard Congress of America (BCA). In the simpler form, the object of play starts and ends with the goal of pocketing one's secret ball. In the second, in addition to the goal of pocketing one's secret ball, points are scored in various ways. In the instance where pills are unavailable, a cloth may be used to cover the balls, which are then chosen blindly, recorded, and replaced for play.
Reportedly invented by Chicagoan Calistus "Kelly" Mulvaney in 1893, kelly pool was a popular game during the early to mid-20th century. Mentions of it were at one time common in US newspapers, often painting it in a negative light, as its play was considered a stronghold of gambling. Authorities in various parts of the United States at times called for a moratorium on the game's play. Until 1964, in fact, playing the game was a fineable offense in Montana. (Full article...) - Image 7The World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA) is the governing body of professional snooker and English billiards. It is headquartered in Bristol, England. Founded as the Professional Billiard Players Association (PBPA) in 1946, with Joe Davis as chairman, it was revived in 1968 after some years of inactivity and renamed the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association in 1970. Its current chairman is Jason Ferguson.
The WPBSA devises and publishes the official rules of the two sports. It promotes their global development at the grassroots, amateur, and professional levels; enforces conduct regulations and disciplines players who breach them; and works to combat corruption, such as by investigating betting irregularities. Additionally, it is involved in coaching development and the training of referees. (Full article...) - Image 8The 1937 World Snooker Championship was a snooker tournament held at Thurston's Hall in London, England from 22 February to 20 March 1937. It is recognised as the 11th edition of the World Snooker Championship. There were nine participants in the event, with debutants Fred Davis (brother of defending champion Joe Davis) and Bill Withers competing in a qualifying match. Withers won the match to join with the remaining seven players in the main event.
Joe Davis won his 11th championship title by defeating Horace Lindrum by 32 frames to 29 in the final, despite trailing 13–17 and 19–21 during the match. The highest break of the tournament was 103, compiled by Joe Davis in the 31st frame of the final. (Full article...) - Image 9The 2019 Veldhoven Open, officially known as the 2019 Dynamic Billard Veldhoven Open, was a professional nine-ball pool tournament and the fourth Euro Tour event of 2019. It was held at the NH Koningshof in Veldhoven, Netherlands. The men's event was held from 1 to 3 August, and the women's event was held from 2 to 4 August. The event followed the Austria Open and preceded the Klagenfurt Open.
The men's defending champion was Austria's Mario He, who won the 2018 Veldhoven Open after defeating Albania's Eklent Kaçi 9–8 in the final. He defended his championship, defeating Kaçi in the first knockout round, Germany's Joshua Filler in the semi-finals and Estonia's Denis Grabe in the final 9–2. In the women's event, the defending champion was Austria's Jasmin Ouschan, who defeated Oliwia Czupryńska 7–3 in the final of the previous year's event. Ouschan also successfully defended her championship, defeating Germany's Melanie Suessenguth 7–4 in the final. The event's total prize fund was €38,000, with the winner receiving €4,500. (Full article...) - Image 10The Tour Championship is a professional snooker tournament first held in 2019. The event features the twelve (previously eight) highest ranked players on the one-year ranking list, which reflects prize money won at ranking events since the beginning of the season. The Tour Championship is the third and final tournament in the Players Series, following the World Grand Prix and the Players Championship. The event features a prize fund of £380,000, with the winner receiving £150,000. The tournament is broadcast by ITV Sport in the United Kingdom and Eurosport across the rest of Europe. The reigning champion is Mark Williams, who won the 2024 Tour Championship with a 10–5 win over Ronnie O'Sullivan in the final. (Full article...)
General images - load new batch
- Image 1A set of standard carom billiard balls, comprising a red object ball, one plain white cue ball, and one dotted white cue ball (replaced in modern three-cushion billiards by a yellow ball) for the opponent (from Carom billiards)
- Image 2A player racking the balls (from Pool (cue sports))
- Image 3alt=Brown snooker ball (from Snooker)
- Image 4alt=Black snooker ball (from Snooker)
- Image 6Illustration A: Aerial view of a snooker table with the balls in their starting positions. The cue ball (white) may be placed anywhere in the semicircle (known as the "D") at the start of the game. (from Snooker)
- Image 7alt=Green snooker ball (from Snooker)
- Image 10Ronnie O'Sullivan has won the World Championship seven times in the 21st century. (from Snooker)
- Image 11A sliding scoreboard, some blocks of cue-tip chalk, white chalk-board chalk, and two cue sticks (from Snooker)
- Image 12Historic print depicting Michael Phelan's Billiard Saloon located at the corner of 10th Street and Broadway in Manhattan, 1 January 1859 (from Carom billiards)
- Image 13Balkline table with standard markings (from Carom billiards)
- Image 14alt=Red snooker ball (from Snooker)
- Image 15Dutch pool player Niels Feijen at the 2008 European Pool Championship (from Pool (cue sports))
- Image 16The Family Remy by Januarius Zick, c. 1776, featuring billiards among other parlour activities (from Carom billiards)
- Image 17A close-up view of a cue tip about to strike the cue ball, the aim being to pot the red ball into a corner pocket (from Snooker)
- Image 19A complete set of snooker balls (from Snooker)
- Image 20A full-size snooker table set up for the start of a game (from Snooker)
- Image 21alt=Yellow snooker ball (from Snooker)
- Image 22Paul Gauguin's 1888 painting Night Café at Arles includes a depiction of French billiards (from Carom billiards)
- Image 23alt=Pink snooker ball (from Snooker)
- Image 26alt=Blue snooker ball (from Snooker)
- Image 27A pool table diagram (from Pool (cue sports))
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