The Masters 2016 10-17 January

[jwinsor]

I still think Ronnie has at least one more World Championship in him.

yes I agree, he won the final of the Masters mostly with his "B" game, when he is at full throttle no one can beat him.

[daffie]

Now I like the idea of showgirls ...oh lalah

I seem to remember one of the last tournaments (was it the UK in december?) where if I remember correctly Steve Davis was lead through a portal of 2 rather voluptuous ladies, just like they do with darts. Now I do remember those ladies rather well, but not so sure if it was SD...I was distracted see

[alabadi]

I seem to remember one of the last tournaments (was it the UK in december?) where if I remember correctly Steve Davis was lead through a portal of 2 rather voluptuous ladies, just like they do with darts. Now I do remember those ladies rather well, but not so sure if it was SD...I was distracted see

Must have been the shootout at Blackpool. I get U Daffie, Indeed what's there to remember about Steve INTERESTING Davies

[mikeyd100]

I seem to remember one of the last tournaments (was it the UK in december?) where if I remember correctly Steve Davis was lead through a portal of 2 rather voluptuous ladies, just like they do with darts. Now I do remember those ladies rather well, but not so sure if it was SD...I was distracted see

Davis was still counting frame scores and breaks in his head when the female streaker turned up in his match :P

[shmeeko69]

Now I like the idea of showgirls ...oh lalah

I do and they belong in my house

[tetricky]

Must have been the shootout at Blackpool. I get U Daffie, Indeed what's there to remember about Steve INTERESTING Davies

How to spell his name?

When Steve Davis came along, he blew me away. I'd never seen a snooker player even vaguely like him before. He laid the foundations for modern snooker.

The boring image is clever marketing....or pandering to people with attention deficit disorder who mistake walking quickly between shots for fast play, or throwing your arm at something, and missing a higher percentage, as exciting play.

Compared with how snooker had been, he was breathtaking to watch. Constantly made good choices, could execute every style of play, eliminated mistakes, showed no weakness. Totally transformational. Of course if you prefer people pissing in the pot plants, that's personal choice, but as a snooker player very few people have moved the game on like he did.

Well to date it was Davis who invented professional snooker, then Hendry who layered on scattering the reds early and trying to finish every frame in one visit. Everything since has just been variations on ability to pot and breakbuild.

There may never be a more exciting snooker player than Steve Davis again.

So rests the case for the defence, m'lud.

[barrywhite]

Well, that wasn't great stuff tonight, let's be honest. Hawkins said he would enjoy this match whatever happened, but he can't possibly have enjoyed playing like that, and he had chance after chance... It's the third time this has happened to him in a big match in the last two years, after losing the 2014 WC semi-final with a session to spare, and almost doing the same the following year. It's not great entertainment, so hopefully he can play better the next time he finds himself in this position. :wink:

All in all, it was a really good tournament during the week, but tournaments are inevitably judged by what happens over the weekend, and this one had a fairly disappointing finish. Well done to O'Sullivan for winning after such a long absence, his first major title in over a year. I had acquired him for my fantasy team prior to this tournament, and he always seems to repay me with a win when I do that. :smile: I wouldn't expect him to dominate for the rest of the season, since he has already failed to qualify for Germany and he is unlikely to travel to China, but he should be one of the favourites for the World title in April.

I suspect the German Masters will not be my favourite tournament this year, with so many top players failing to qualify, and Eurosport always seem to be determined to ruin it with dreadful coverage, but I'm looking forward to it nonetheless. :smile:

Cheers Ordl, once again, a nicely balanced summary.

To cheer you all up if you haven't seen it, Shots of the Championship from the Beeb:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/snooker/35337902

There isn't the variety of player I'd hoped for; Daffie and tetricky, look away kids, this will hurt you! LOL

[vilkrang]

Remember when Steve Davis won the Masters in 1997? Everyone was saying what an amazing achievement it was that such an old player could win one of the majors.

Ronnie is roughly the same age as when Davis won the Masters in 1997. I'm not saying it's impossible for him to win a 6th World title but winning the Masters at 40 is a massive achievement and if equalling Hendry's Masters record is the last thing he manages to achieve then whilst he will of course have under achieved with the talent he had been blessed with, equalling Hendry's Masters record at age 40 isn't a bad major win to end on (similarly Federer should perhaps have won more than 17 Grand Slams with the amount of finals he's been in over the last few years but if the last thing he achieves ends up being tying Sampras' Wimbledon record, again it's not a bad last achievement).

Can he win another world title? Of course, but he's not the favourite, he makes too many errors and long potting aside I thought he started to show his age in this tournament with his cue ball control, he usually has it on a piece of string but I've never seen him struggling for position so much over the course of a tournament. His potting got him out of trouble on a lot of occasions but his eyes will go now he is 40 and if what he says is true about starting smoking and stopping running then this might well be the last major he wins.

I hope it isn't as with his talent he should have at least equalled Hendry's World tally but he has a small chance of winning the UK with the shorter format (which I hate and don't really class as the same tournament so Davis will always be king there) and I'd say he has a shot at owning the Masters record out right in the next 2 to 3 years but after that he won't be winning majors, the signs are already there that he is slipping and no snooker player has consistently won majors in their 40s for decades. Winning the Masters at 40 is huge.

[gavpowell]

Of course if you prefer people pissing in the pot plants, that's personal choice

Aaah Ronnie, the innovative early work.

[SnookerFan]

I actually wouldn't be surprised if Ronnie wins The Crucible this year. He tends to win if he can take some time off first and relax.

Depends how much we see him play between now and Sheffield.

[shmeeko69]

I actually wouldn't be surprised if Ronnie wins The Crucible this year. He tends to win if he can take some time off first and relax.

Depends how much we see him play between now and Sheffield.

There's only a few folk imo who stand in his way and the obvious one's are Trump, Selby and Robertson with Higgins and Murphy being possibilities. If he REALLY wants it then, grabbing a 6th title and equaling Davis and Reardon is within his grasp.

[P.Smith]

I suppose Bingo had no chance against him en route to winning the world title. Selby had no chance of winning against him in the Masters, he's never done that before! lol

Yawn. Tripe.

Crikey I really did upset you then eh?

As I said, there are exceptions but most of the time Ronnie matches are not interesting to watch. Sorry to offend you.

[daffie]

Crikey I really did upset you then eh?

As I said, there are exceptions but most of the time Ronnie matches are not interesting to watch. Sorry to offend you.

Oh you're certainly not the only one...think I may have upset dear mr barrywhite as well Whenever someone has a different opinion to the ronboys...that is when we don't praise the road Ronnie walks on and we like other type of matches...actual close hard-fought and non one-sided ones, then the ronboys tend to get really upset.

Ah well...

[P.Smith]

Oh you're certainly not the only one...think I may have upset dear mr barrywhite as well Whenever someone has a different opinion to the ronboys...that is when we don't praise the road Ronnie walks on and we like other type of matches...actual close hard-fought and non one-sided ones, then the ronboys tend to get really upset.

Ah well...

It's quite strange because Barry White always seemed like a laid back sort of fellow, certainly not one to get angry at differing opinions.

[daffie]

It's quite strange because Barry White always seemed like a laid back sort of fellow, certainly not one to get angry at differing opinions.

I don't actually recall him specifically from earlier tournaments on this forum, but you may be right. Then again, very often when the ronster plays many fanboys (btw barrywhite is not 100% within this camp..he can relativate) tend to come out of the woodwork to spout their everlasting love and admiration for him, and furthermore tend to disregard everything else (other players, the game of snooker in itself, normal discussions, and so on). Have to admit, myself I tend to get rather defensive about that....because I really do not like those very one-sided 'discussions'.

All this banter back&forth is ok imo though, it's all part of the forum