The Masters 2016 10-17 January

[SnookerFan]

You're joking? Seriously? Jesus, what's he gonna tell us, how to make a 12 break in six minutes? Wow, this Masters could be ruined by snail commentary.

Maybe he's going to do some features about vegan cooking. It means they won't have to keep cutting away to the Hairy Bikers now.

[gavpowell]

Looking fwd to your expert commentary on this thread from Sunday, two days to go! They moved to the Pally due to Wembley refurb I think. Are there plans to move back to Wembley eventually?

So far as I know, the only refurbs of Wembley Arena were 2014 and 2006ish when the stadium was finished. I was under the impression the move was because Hearn already had the darts at Ally Pally, and presumably was able to get a better deal.

[SnookerFan]

So far as I know, the only refurbs of Wembley Arena were 2014 and 2006ish when the stadium was finished. I was under the impression the move was because Hearn already had the darts at Ally Pally, and presumably was able to get a better deal.

For all this talk of atmosphere of venue, I wouldn't be in the least bit surprised if Hearn took snooker to the Ally Pally so he could get a frequest customer discount. Bear in mind he has that table tennis thingy in January as well.

[barrywhite]

For all this talk of atmosphere of venue, I wouldn't be in the least bit surprised if Hearn took snooker to the Ally Pally so he could get a frequest customer discount. Bear in mind he has that table tennis thingy in January as well.

I don't like it in the same venue as the darts I must say. The masters should be at Wembley for me.

[barrywhite]

Schedule on the Beeb:

Sunday, 10 January

First round (best of 11 frames)

Shaun Murphy (Eng) v Mark Allen (NI) - 13:00

BBC Two, 13:00-17:00 (14:00-17:00, BBC Two Wales)

BBC Red Button, 17:00-18:00, uninterrupted online from 12:50-18:00

Stuart Bingham (Eng) v Ding Junhui (Chn) - 19:00

BBC Red Button & Online, 19:00-23:00

Highlights on BBC Two at 23:00 (23:45 in Wales; 23:25 in NI) and Snooker Extra at 01:05 on Monday (02:10 in Scotland)


I'm going for a 6-3 victory to Murphy, he has too much for Allen I reckon. And a 6-5 victory for Ding. Both are out of sorts but I fancy Ding to rekindle Masters good memories. Thoughts?

[Odrl]

So, another snooker week is almost upon us...

The Masters has always been one of my favourite tournaments of the season, and it often sees a very high standard of play, although there have certainly been exceptions as well. When the Champion of Champions was introduced a few years ago, a lot of people were afraid it would just be another copy of the Masters, but looking at the field of both events this season, there are a lot of differences. Kyren Wilson is a major ranking event winner this season, but he has missed out on the Masters, as have two major finalists, Martin Gould and David Gilbert, while Liang Wenbo only just made it. Instead we have quite a few players who are going through a bit of a drought at the moment, but as they say, class is permanent, and it's only a matter of time before the likes of Ding or Hawkins rediscover their form.

As promised, a few thoughts about the draw...

Quarter 1:

Shaun Murphy v. Mark Allen
Barry Hawkins v. Joe Perry

A fairly weak quarter to start with, considering the results of the season so far. Shaun Murphy won this title with a terrific performance a year ago, and played some of the best snooker in the world in the following months, but he wasn't able to add any other major title in 2015. He has been one of the biggest disappointments this season, failing to reach the business end of any major event. His best result is the last16 stage, but that was the case last season prior to the Masters as well. Mark Allen has been in better form recently, a semi-finalist in the Shanghai Masters, a quarter-finalist in the International Championship, and he also reached the final of the Champion of Champions. That said, he hasn't won a major title for almost three years now, and never one outside of China. His record against Murphy is quite dreadful, Murphy having won all eight of their major matches in the past. They played in the semi-finals of this tournament last year, and Allen actually led 2-0, but Murphy played almost perfect snooker to win the next six frames. They also played each other in the German Masters a few weeks later, and I seem to remember Murphy getting a snooker in the penultimate frame to force the decider, then winning the match with a big break, although I might be wrong.

Barry Hawkins and Joe Perry haven't met on the big stage for seven years, so they don't have much of a history. Both have struggled in this event over the years. In fact, Hawkins has never won a match at the Masters, even though he led Walden 4-1 two years ago and looked untouchable, but he still found a way to lose in the end. His season so far has been awful, not even a single decent run to point out, and while his form is bound to return at some point, he comes to this event as a big underdog. Perry was in a similar position to Hawkins for years, in terms of his Masters record, but he finally managed to win a match last year, before getting involved in that horrendous scrap against Allen in the quarter-finals. He started this season quite well, but got some tough draws and actually ended up losing to the eventual winner in the first three major ranking events, as well as in the Champion of Champions. The year ended on a really low note for him. He played awful stuff in the UK Championship and lost early to Robbie Williams, then showed a lack of class after the match and blamed his defeat on Williams' style and pace of play, instead of reflecting on his own poor play. Karma rewarded him with a match against Rory McLeod in the German Masters qualifiers just before the new year, and Perry lost that one as well, so things are not going well for him at the moment. Hopefully the new year break has given him a chance to recompose himself, and we see better from him this week.

So, this quarter has a mix of out-of-form players and players who struggle at the Masters, but one of them has to reach the semi-finals, and Murphy looks like by far the best bet. He has a superb record against all three of his opponents in this quarter, having won 17 of the 18 major matches against them in the past. It's tough to argue with a record like that. The only player who has managed to beat Murphy in a major match is Hawkins, but the last time they played was in the semi-finals of the World Championship last season, where Murphy was on the verge of winning with a session to spare, and still won with a comfortable 17-9 scoreline even after a minor fightback from Hawkins. Murphy has also won all four of his major matches against Perry in the past, including a 13-5 demolition in the World Championship, when Murphy was going for everything and getting most. Looking past Murphy, another interesting pairing in the quarter-finals here could be Hawkins and Allen, yet another repeat of a match from the last World Championship. Hawkins was victorious on that occasion, winning the last five frames to prevail 13-11 in the last16. The only pairing I would find uninteresting here is Allen against Perry, after their poor display last year, in the match I've already mentioned.

Quarter 2:

Judd Trump v. Stephen Maguire
Neil Robertson v. Marco Fu

A much more intriguing quarter, where all four players could potentially win the tournament, but none of them is immune to a good old 1st round exit. Judd Trump has never really come close to winning the Masters in the past, so I think he still has something to prove in this tournament. He has been waiting for a major title for a while now, but all in all he hasn't played too badly this season, coming close to winning the Shanghai Masters with a 10-9 defeat in the final. He had a promising start in the UK Championship as well, but his game fell apart from 4-1 up against Liang. His biggest problem here is the draw itself, because Stephen Maguire has proven to be a bit of a bogey player for him over the years. Trump is the more consistent player of the two these days, and generally comes closer to winning major titles, but Maguire already has a win against him this season, 5-1 in the quarter-finals of the Australian Open, and he also beat him in the Masters last year. Maguire has four previous semi-final appearances at the Masters, but he too has never really come all that close to winning it. His best this season is a semi-final in Australia, but since then he hasn't done much. He looked to be playing fairly well in the UK Championship, but he came up against an inspired Robertson as early as the last16 stage, so he never really had much chance for a good run. This will surely be one of the most interesting 1st round pairings here. :smile:

You can say the same about Neil Robertson against Marco Fu. Robertson is the man of the moment, having won back-to-back titles before the new year, and his performance in the UK Championship in particular was superb. That said, Fu has a pretty good record against him. He beat him in the final of the Australian Open two seasons ago, then went on to beat him in the World Open as well, when Robertson had that infamous 7-minute break of 7 in the decider. I am not really sure how to call this one. On one hand, Robertson's form is not in question, and he has played very well at the Masters in recent years, reaching the final in three of the last four editions. Winning the UK Championship used to be a bit of curse, as far as the winner's chances at the Masters were concerned, but the addition of the International Championship and the Champion of Champions has changed the shape of this part of the season, so the recent UK champions have actually done alright at the Masters, including Selby's back-to-back titles in 2012/2013. On the other hand, it's easy to take your foot off the gas a little after a big success, especially during the holiday period. I don't think it would be a huge surprise if Robertson came to the Masters poorly prepared, especially following his surprise 5-1 defeat to Ashley Hugill in the German Masters qualifiers. Fu is the opposite case, having won the PTC in Gibraltar just after the UK Championship, and he could be the more determined of the two here. He reached a series of major quarter-finals last season, without ever getting past that stage, and he has continued in similar style this season, reaching the quarter-finals of the International and the UK Championships, both best-of-11 events just like the Masters. Like Robertson, Fu seems to lose in a lot of deciders these days, and some of his play under pressure has been a little suspect. He was a finalist in 2011, but it will be difficult to get through this part of the draw and match that achievement.

The quarter-final match here should be a very good one, whoever comes through. The Robertson-Maguire rivalry in particular has been great over the years. Maguire has the better record, but it was 1-1 in 2015, and their most recent match was that ridiculous thrashing Robertson administered in the UK Championship. It's worth noting that Maguire is the only player to beat Robertson in the early rounds of the Masters in recent years though. Robertson has also enjoyed a good rivalry with Trump in the last five years or so. Well, "enjoyed" may not be the best way of putting it, because it's Trump that has had the more success, winning five out of seven major matches between them. Quite a few of those have been over multiple sessions, and it's a bit of a shame it would only be a best-of-11 here. Trump also has a good record over Fu, including two comfortable wins over three sessions at the Crucible, while Maguire and Fu rarely meet these days, but Maguire does have a notable win over Fu in the quarter-finals of the 2014 UK Championship, 6-4. As I said, this quarter is quite difficult to predict. An in-form Robertson would be the favourite, probably followed by Trump, but there is no way of telling how well the players will play here. And when you take the head-to-head record into account as well, anything could happen. If I absolutely had to call it, I would probably go with Fu.

Quarter 3:

Mark Selby v. Ricky Walden
Ronnie O'Sullivan v. Mark Williams

Probably the second most intriguing quarter, mainly because of what the quarter-final match might be. Mark Selby is one of the very best players the Masters has ever seen. He has only played in eight editions, but his record in those is superb, with three wins and five finals in total. He also has a remarkable record in deciders at the Masters, winning his first eleven, before finally losing to Murphy last year. He is still to win a major title this season, but he did reach the semi-finals of both best-of-11 events, and he lost to the eventual winner both times, Higgins in the International and Robertson in the UK Championship. In hindsight, he can't be too disappointed with that. Ricky Walden is a completely different story at the Masters. He has been close to the top of the game for quite a long time now, but he hasn't appeared at the Masters all that often, and never had much success. He failed to perform in the two biggest events before the new year, and he also lost in the qualifiers for the German Masters, so it's a case of trying to salvage something from this season for him now. The job is as tough as it gets here, starting with Selby in the 1st round, and Walden has only beaten Selby twice in the nine major matches they've played. Quite a few of those nine have been best-of-11s, but no really memorable ones.

A lot of attention will be on Ronnie O'Sullivan this week. His return to snooker hasn't been the best, he lost in the qualifiers for the German Masters, but playing at a major venue is a different thing altogether. He wasn't exactly playing his best snooker before he took a break from the game, but there was always the feeling that good form wasn't out of reach for him. He also has that almost unique ability to win tournaments when he is playing nothing special, like he did in the 2015 UK Championship. Apart from shot-clock snooker in the Premier League, the Masters has arguably been O'Sullivan's best event over the years. He has played in ten finals and won five of them, and he has produced some of his most memorable performances here. Mark Williams is a dream draw for him, in all honesty. O'Sullivan has always had a good record against him, and it went from good to superb in the 12 years from 2002 to 2014, when Williams couldn't beat him even once. One of their better matches in that period was the semi-final of the 2010 Masters, when Williams had a golden chance in the decider and bottled it, and O'Sullivan ended up winning 6-5. The run finally came to an end last season, in the International Championship, when it was Williams who prevailed 6-5. Thinking back to that match, it wasn't all that great, and O'Sullivan actually led 3-0 before Williams started playing a bit. I think Williams realized that wasn't the kind of match he should be losing, and he seemed to make a mental switch halfway through the match. It will be interesting to see how he plays this time. The signs are not great really, his only good tournament this season so far was the Shanghai Masters, everything else has been quite poor, the kind of form that caused him to miss the last two editions of the Masters actually...

So, a potential O'Sullivan-Selby clash is what most of us are looking forward to, I would imagine. They have been the two best players in the Masters in the last eight years or so, and their two finals both broke the "most users ever online" record on this forum at the time. It's the ultimate clash of styles, and the tension is always very high, on the forum as well as in the arena itself. It's debatable what constitutes a "major match", but I would say they have met in 12 of them, and won six each. That's going all the way back to 2002 though, which seems like ancient history, particularly for Selby. Their last match was the World final in 2014, which Selby won with a few frames to spare in the end, but it could have easily gone the other way. I think Selby is pretty reliable these days, while O'Sullivan is the big mystery, so it should come down to how O'Sullivan plays here. Obviously I can't see into the future, so I will play it safe and go for Selby to come through this quarter. He should be the favourite if he ends up playing Williams as well. They've had some great matches over the years, but Selby has won their last two big ones 6-1 and 5-1, so he should have the psychological advantage, although Williams did get some revenge in the smaller tournaments over the last 12 months or so. O'Sullivan's best chance to come through is if he faces Walden in the quarter-finals. They've played each other in the last two years at the Masters, O'Sullivan won 6-0 in 2014, breaking the "points without reply" record at one point, but 2015 was a much closer affair, O'Sullivan winning 6-4.

Quarter 4:

John Higgins v. Liang Wenbo
Stuart Bingham v. Ding Junhui

The fourth quarter is slightly weaker again, although certainly not lacking in big names. It could have been the toughest quarter in different circumstances, but not this week... John Higgins is one of the reasons, for a start. A winner of two major titles already this season, and certainly back to being among the very best players in the world. He pushed Robertson all the way to a decider in the quarter-finals of the UK Championship, in the match that could have easily been the final, had the draw worked out differently. But this is arguably his worst tournament. It's 10 years since he last won it, and he hasn't really had a memorable year at the Masters since. He has lost in the 1st round on 11 occasions out of 21, even though he was the favourite in the vast majority of those matches. Even in some of his very best seasons he still struggled at the Masters, so it's quite clear that he doesn't like it. He was also one of the victims of the recent German Masters qualifiers, so perhaps his purple patch is coming to an end now. Having said that, he has never lost to Liang Wenbo in any event, major or minor, and he most recently beat him in Shanghai this season, 5-1. What to say about Liang? He is the only player in this tournament who hasn't really won anything major yet (although you could argue that Perry hasn't either), and the only debutant in the field. It's nice to finally see him at the Masters. Most of you will know my feelings about the 2010 wildcard controversy. I thought the decision was a disgrace, and it may or may not be a coincidence that Liang's results declined rather dramatically after that, so I'm sure this tournament will mean a lot to him. At 28 years of age he should be in his best years now, and his performance in the UK Championship was a sign of that. He particularly impressed me in the close matches, when he was under the most pressure. He also reached the semi-finals of the Gibraltar Open just before the new year, so perhaps this is his best chance to finally beat Higgins. :smile:

Stuart Bingham is another player who has never been past the 1st round of the Masters. His success in recent years has been unexpected for most people, myself included, but Bingham has handled it very well and has never really looked out of place on the big stage after winning his first ranking event. He is the World champion now, so the expectations have understandably grown this season, and I suspect Bingham will not be satisfied with how things are going. His best result in the major events this season is a semi-final in Shanghai, but other than that he has been struggling. He was also a semi-finalist in the PTC in Gibraltar, beating Ding Junhui on his way. Ding is of course another reason why this quarter looks a little unimpressive to me. He won the Masters in 2011, but has lost in the 1st round every year since. He has struggled badly for some time now. He missed the Champion of Champions, since he is not actually the champion of any notable event any more, and he could be in danger of dropping out of the top16 when his German Masters and China Open points from 2014 come off. To make matters worse, he has failed to qualify for this season's German Masters as well. I can't really find any positives for him, apart from the fact that class is permanent, as the saying goes. As for the head-to-head between these two, Bingham has had the edge in recent times.

I would be mildly surprised if one of these four players ended up winning the tournament, but one of them has to reach the semi-finals... Higgins will fancy his chances against Liang, and possibly against Bingham as well. He hasn't actually played Bingham a lot since Bingham's rise to the top of the game, but he's still beaten him every time in this period, including at the Masters in 2014. He also had a good record against Ding for many years, but that's turned around somewhat in the more recent times. Ding has won all three of their major matches in the last two years, including the last16 of the 2015 World Championship, where he turned a 5-1 deficit into a fairly comfortable victory in the end. It was the sort of performance that could make him a contender this week as well, but unfortunately we don't see it from him all that often these days. Perhaps the most interesting pairing in the quarter-finals would be Ding against Liang. They have only met once in any match of decent length, in the 2009 World Championship, when Ding was the winner, but they've played a few shorter matches and, surprisingly, Liang has won them all. It's a really tough quarter to call, but since I am stuck with Ding in a fantasy game I'm playing, I will do a bit of wishful thinking and go for Ding to advance. :smile:

Possible semi-final line-up:

Shaun Murphy v. Marco Fu
Mark Selby v. Ding Junhui


There we are. It's a great line-up and every match has the potential to be very exciting, so it should be a great week of snooker.

[barrywhite]

Cheers Ordl, I've just enjoyed that build-up from you, well written and some interesting points you make.

On to the matches. Yeah, Fu is a tricky one for Robbo, contrasting styles. It almost suits Robbo to play a potter with a similar rhythm and game-plan, then outgun him. Folk like Fu and Selby cause problems for potters. Difficult to call that one. In theory, Ronnie and Trump should both win, but which Ronnie and which Trump will turn up?!

Selby, Smurf, the Hawk and Higgins should all go through from easier draws but folk like Wenbo will be a handful. Higgins is quite calm and that's gonna contrast nicely with Wenbo's street fighter.

I honestly can't pick a semi or a winner, there is so much talent there to choose from. Snooker is in a rich vein; I'm not placing any bets. We are blessed. Let the tournament begin!

[motorhead]

yessss, was looking forward to Odrl's preview!

I seem to remember Murphy getting a snooker in the penultimate frame to force the decider, then winning the match with a big break,

that's correct!

[mythman69]

"Most of you will know my feelings about the 2010 wildcard controversy"

Forgive me, but what was the controversy?

[Odrl]

Forgive me, but what was the controversy?

Before 2011, the Masters used to include a wildcard (or sometimes two), on top of the top16 players in the rankings. You may remember that the rankings used to be updated only after the World Championship, so the provisional rankings were often a lot different than the official ones, and the top16 was sometimes not very close to the actual 16 best players in the world. For example, Stephen Maguire won the 2004 UK Championship and was provisionally in the top4 of the rankings, but officially he was out of the top16, so he didn't get an automatic place in the Masters. That meant the 2005 Masters had Maguire and Ding Junhui playing as wildcards, 2008 had Marco Fu, who had won the Grand Prix earlier in the season, 2009 had Ricky Walden as the Shanghai Masters champion, and so on... They were generally fairly sensible decisions, and whenever there was no obvious choice, they would just give it to Steve Davis or Jimmy White.

A lot of us thought the obvious choice in 2010 was Liang Wenbo. He was the Shanghai Masters finalist that season, where he lost to Ronnie O'Sullivan, and he got to the quarter-finals of the UK Championship just before Christmas. Instead, World Snooker gave the wildcard to Jimmy White who, in my opinion, had done nothing to deserve it, although a lot of people argued that wildcards were not about rewarding competitive results anyway.

It was also argued that Liang would get into the Masters on merit the following season anyway. Liang finished the season 16th in the rankings, but of course that was the year when the rolling rankings were first introduced, and Liang was out of the top16 again by the time the Masters places were rewarded, and only got back last month. That's why I'm particularly happy to see him in the tournament this year. :smile:

[mythman69]

World Snooker gave the wildcard to Jimmy White who, in my opinion, had done nothing to deserve it

Thanks for that! Great info as usual

My tip: ROS versus Neil Robertson in the final.

Neil to win!

[motorhead]

Liang finished the season 16th in the rankings, but of course that was the year when the rolling rankings were first introduced, and Liang was out of the top16 again by the time the Masters places were rewarded, and only got back last month.

LOL, talking about good timing. Thanks for reminding us this.


QF Selby-ROS would be great.

[SnookerFan]

I am going up to watch Mark Allen vs Shaun Murphy. Hoping to get home in enough time to see Ding vs Bing.

[barrywhite]

I am going up to watch Mark Allen vs Shaun Murphy. Hoping to get home in enough time to see Ding vs Bing.

I may have to watch bits of Smurf at my club and then come back to watch Ding-Bing.

[itsnoteasy]

Is the masters draw, drawn out of a hat so to speak or is it 1 v16, 2 v15 etc, that second quarter of the draw is very strong compared to most.