1st Round Draw

[Neil Taperell]

Some interesting matches ……….shock horror Ding hasn't been drawn against Donaldson .........bit i'm sure that t

here will be some very large international audience for his match against Marco Fu .

And a battle between a couple of long standing tour members : Jimmy White v James Wattana .

TSF's very own Fraser Patrick has a tricky encounter with Xiao Guodong ……….play well Fraser :snooker:

[DeanH]

First Session Monday, Table 1
David Gilbert v Matthew Stevens - Gilbert being an inform player and Stevens being Welsh

or could be (but probably on Table 2
Daniel Wells v Barry Pinches - Wells being Welsh and Pinches T16

[crocodile]

Can someone explain how the draw for the tournaments particularly with a starting field of 128 (like this one) or 64 players actually takes place? I always imagined that the proverbial person wearing velvet gloves draws coloured balls out of a hat, but I have a feeling that I'm completely wrong. Is it more so that it's calculated in some way? If so, then I'm totally at a loss as to which method is used ....

[DeanH]

I believe for the flat-128 events it is a random draw; whether by a bag of balls or by a electronic randomiser I dont know.

[crocodile]

I believe for the flat-128 events it is a random draw; whether by a bag of balls or by a electronic randomiser I dont know.

I'm not too sure about this though - the result could be that for example nos. 4 and 6 in the ranking list are drawn against each other in the first round, which I'm sure shouldn't happen. Or is it perhaps the case that the top 16 in the rankings are first segregated out and the rest of the draw is made in such a way that none of them can play each other?

Think I'll have to study the draw again and try to find some kind of system ....