2016 International Championship

[JimMalone]

It's difficult to argue with a 10-1 scoreline, very well played to Selby. It was probably his most impressive performance since the demolition of Stephen Hendry in the 2011 World Championship. The International Championship was the only really big tournament missing in his collection, so we can now say that Selby has pretty much won everything in snooker. Winning multiple tournaments in a season is obviously very difficult, but a bloc of big events is approaching, and surely Selby is going into them as the favourite. :smile:

I wondered already during Selbys superb semifinal against Bingham, when in my opinion he played even better than in the final, if he was extra-motivated in Daqing this week, because he had never before won this tournament.

[trains]

Next stop for the Jester and Ding,a £650k invitational event in the same land of the Red Dragon.
Lucky for some I suppose.

[cueman]

Terrible performance by Ding, no excuses either, Trump understandably struggled in their semi final because of the amount of matches he'd played and a close quarter final with Murphy the day before. Ding had a days rest and won the semi final comfortably, yet didn't really show anything.

I still feel Ding is a very fragile player, great when he goes in front early on in matches, but when the pressure comes on or his opponent builds up a lead he gives up and struggles too often to call him a top player. That sounds daft considering what he's won but I don't think he'll ever go down as one of the legends like Hendry, Higgins, Ronnie, Williams etc. I wouldn't even put him in the same bracket at Robbo, Murphy or Selby either as they have all won the big 3 tournaments.

Be interesting to see what damage this does to his confidence because the last time he lost a big final was the masters against Ronnie and he struggled for a good 18 months after that.

[PatBlock]

It's just his ninth and this still is a fairly low number for the player he is.

Very true, but despite having to rely on his B game for some time now, he still holds on to that No. 1 spot like the limpet he is. How long has it been now, 5, 6 years? And I ITIRIS he'll be 300,000 points in front of Bingham after this event is taken into account.

-

[jonny66]

Terrible performance by Ding, no excuses either, Trump understandably struggled in their semi final because of the amount of matches he'd played and a close quarter final with Murphy the day before. Ding had a days rest and won the semi final comfortably, yet didn't really show anything.

I still feel Ding is a very fragile player, great when he goes in front early on in matches, but when the pressure comes on or his opponent builds up a lead he gives up and struggles too often to call him a top player. That sounds daft considering what he's won but I don't think he'll ever go down as one of the legends like Hendry, Higgins, Ronnie, Williams etc. I wouldn't even put him in the same bracket at Robbo, Murphy or Selby either as they have all won the big 3 tournaments.

Be interesting to see what damage this does to his confidence because the last time he lost a big final was the masters against Ronnie and he struggled for a good 18 months after that.

Remember that big tournament in April/May this year?

[JimMalone]

Very true, but despite having to rely on his B game for some time now, he still holds on to that No. 1 spot like the limpet he is. How long has it been now, 5, 6 years? And I ITIRIS he'll be 300,000 points in front of Bingham after this event is taken into account.

-

Five years it is. But this is exactly what I meant. During this time span you should have expected he would have won more titles. Speaks probably for his consistency. He is so hard to beat even, when he is not playing his best. (And obviously when he plays at his best even more so)

I find it also quite interesting that for somebody who is so mentally strong he has quite an average record in finals. Though you could argue that most of his final losses came earlier and not in the span, when he was playing his best snooker.

[JimMalone]

Terrible performance by Ding, no excuses either, Trump understandably struggled in their semi final because of the amount of matches he'd played and a close quarter final with Murphy the day before. Ding had a days rest and won the semi final comfortably, yet didn't really show anything.

I still feel Ding is a very fragile player, great when he goes in front early on in matches, but when the pressure comes on or his opponent builds up a lead he gives up and struggles too often to call him a top player. That sounds daft considering what he's won but I don't think he'll ever go down as one of the legends like Hendry, Higgins, Ronnie, Williams etc. I wouldn't even put him in the same bracket at Robbo, Murphy or Selby either as they have all won the big 3 tournaments.

Be interesting to see what damage this does to his confidence because the last time he lost a big final was the masters against Ronnie and he struggled for a good 18 months after that.

I hope and believe that this time Ding will overcome this loss pretty well. He should still have confidence from reaching the final of the World Championship a few months ago. Also this season he has been the second most succesful player behind Selby so far. Really would hope that this will finally be the season where he goes all the way in Sheffield.

[DeanH]

2016 International Championship

how Ding moves on after this final will show how much he has matured on top of the maturity already shown since WSC final earlier this year

[mick745]

Selby now joint 9th in the list of players with most ranking tournament wins with 9, equal with John Parrott and Peter Ebdon. Next in his sights is Jimmy White on 10, and he's in a good battle with Neil robertson and Ding Junhui on 12.

He's joint 8th on the number of ranking finals level with John Parrott on 18, one behind Neil Robertson (19) and one ahead of Ding (17). Hendry way out ahead on 57 ranking finals. 92 different players have now reached ranking finals.

[Kargetina]

Terrible performance by Ding, no excuses either, Trump understandably struggled in their semi final because of the amount of matches he'd played and a close quarter final with Murphy the day before. Ding had a days rest and won the semi final comfortably, yet didn't really show anything.

I still feel Ding is a very fragile player, great when he goes in front early on in matches, but when the pressure comes on or his opponent builds up a lead he gives up and struggles too often to call him a top player. That sounds daft considering what he's won but I don't think he'll ever go down as one of the legends like Hendry, Higgins, Ronnie, Williams etc. I wouldn't even put him in the same bracket at Robbo, Murphy or Selby either as they have all won the big 3 tournaments.

Be interesting to see what damage this does to his confidence because the last time he lost a big final was the masters against Ronnie and he struggled for a good 18 months after that.

These groupings make little to no sense to me.

Selby has been the World number one for 5 straight years, neither Robo and Murphy have been on top for a single one.

Williams has three years on top, 2 WSC, 2 UK, 2 Masters while Selby has 5 years on top, 2 WSC, 1 UK, 3 Masters, so to place one of them in different tiers seems pretty weird.

Hendry/Ronnie/Davis
Higgins/Reardon
Williams/Selby/A.Higgins
Robertson/Murphy/Thorburn/Ebdon

Ding is a WSC away from getting to the upper tier. Selby is a WSC/UK title away from leaving Williams and A.Higgins behind

[Ethanat]

I hate to say this but Ding might replace Jimmy as the best player never to win the WSC. Something is missing. Hope I am wrong.

[gavpowell]

I hate to say this but Ding might replace Jimmy as the best player never to win the WSC. Something is missing. Hope I am wrong.

I've never been mad about Ding so I don't mind that, though I would say as Ronnie falls away, the tournaments will become a lot more open, so he could still win one.

[JimMalone]

These groupings make little to no sense to me.

Selby has been the World number one for 5 straight years, neither Robo and Murphy have been on top for a single one.

Williams has three years on top, 2 WSC, 2 UK, 2 Masters while Selby has 5 years on top, 2 WSC, 1 UK, 3 Masters, so to place one of them in different tiers seems pretty weird.

Hendry/Ronnie/Davis
Higgins/Reardon
Williams/Selby/A.Higgins
Robertson/Murphy/Thorburn/Ebdon

Ding is a WSC away from getting to the upper tier. Selby is a WSC/UK title away from leaving Williams and A.Higgins behind

I'm on you with this. Selby is a tier above Robbo and Murphy, in the same as Mark Williams.
You could also argue though that John Higgins and Reardon should be in the top tier as well.

Also Doherty should be in the Robertson/Murphy/Thorburn/Ebdon tier. As well as Jimmy White.

Though of course those comparisons over different eras are always a bit complicated.

[Odrl]

Selby now joint 9th in the list of players with most ranking tournament wins with 9, equal with John Parrott and Peter Ebdon. Next in his sights is Jimmy White on 10, and he's in a good battle with Neil robertson and Ding Junhui on 12.

He's joint 8th on the number of ranking finals level with John Parrott on 18, one behind Neil Robertson (19) and one ahead of Ding (17). Hendry way out ahead on 57 ranking finals. 92 different players have now reached ranking finals.

Well, I think this comparison is pretty pointless if you are going to count all the best-of-7 stuff that passes as a ranking event these days. Selby has twice as many chances to win them as someone like Parrott did, so 9 is a much less impressive number for him.

While the calendar is much busier now, the number of the kind of ranking events that were available in Parrott's time has largely stayed the same. For example, this year we have 7 ranking events with matches of at least medium length. So if you compare players by those events only, Jimmy White still has 10, Parrot has 9, Robertson has 10 (including the 2006 Grand Prix which had a group stage with shorter matches), Ding has 9 and Selby has 8. I'm not trying to go on one of my anti best-of-7 rants again, I just think this comparison is a little more relevant. :smile:

[Hal]

Happy for Mark, he played to very best standart you can wish for, especially during the semifinal. I think that was after some time he actually played his best. Wanted a bit closer final but Ding did not show up at all. November will be interesting....
Btw, why they display on board M. Selby but Ding Junhui has his whole name shown?