Was Selby doing an Ebdon?

[PaulTheSoave]

This morning I have spoken to a few collegues and friends after coming back. At least three of them were of the opinion Selby used slowing tactics on the second day. At play I was not aware of it though I found it a bit strange Selby went down for a shot and then coming up again on almost any shot he was taking on. Anyone having an opinion?

ps, Selby played great to come back from 12-4.

[berolina]

I don't think he did an Ebdon, he took only 1 minute per shot
Seriously, it seemed to me, that he didn't slow down the game deliberatly. He just didn't want to make a mistake...besides after hours of play you need some time to concentrate and consider the consequences of the next shot

[dannyd0g]

This morning I have spoken to a few collegues and friends after coming back. At least three of them were of the opinion Selby used slowing tactics on the second day. At play I was not aware of it though I found it a bit strange Selby went down for a shot and then coming up again on almost any shot he was taking on. Anyone having an opinion?

ps, Selby played great to come back from 12-4.

About 3 people on here thought that Selby was using 'gamesmanship' to try to put off JH. IMO that is definately not the case. He seemed to take awhile to be psyching himself up or mentally preparing for some of his brilliant long pots that he got. Also who could begrudge him some thinking time to consider all aspects of a safety shot. In both of these scenarios he didnt take much over 1 minute - which is not unreasonable atall.

I think the getting up off the shot was due to self doubt or being put off by something. If any flicker of doubt crosses your mind on the shot, Steve Davis always used to advise get up and start again. On a couple of occasions some plonkers in the audience did cough right as he was about to execute his shots.

IMO this was certainly nothing to do with gamesmanship either.

[April madness]

hi Paul, welcome back

I have to agree to what berolina and dannyd0g already said, don't think Selby tried to put Higgins off by a slow play. yes, he was taking some time for shots, I thought he doesn't feel too comfortable in tactical play, as he had some problems when escaping snookers, so obviously taking more time to think about a tough shot is just normal.

[ronnieisthebest]

He was definately not doing an Ebdon! Just the way he plays I think - first final and everything wants to take his time and not make a mistake!

[Black_cat]

Doing an Ebdon wins you the match. So is pondering a break of 12 for 5 minutes. So obviously he wasn't.
Seriously. I didn't feel like Selby was trying to put JH off and, as other posters have already written, he took his time only on difficult shots.

[PaulTheSoave]

Very good one, black cat. It indeed wins you a match.

I tend to agree after reading your well balanced posts it was not deliberate slowing down. Surely the safeties were not easy to go at numerous times. I better get back to my friends and sort them out.

[Ekphantos]

To me he seemed to deliberately slow down, but, saying that, it was the FINAL of the WC, so it is difficult to judge from this particular match. If he really uses this "technique", he is going to do it again in other matches, so I guess I'll just wait and see before I make up my mind.

[ronnieisthebest]

I didnt even think he was that slow! The only thing he was actually slow on was thinking time on certain shots, not actually making simple pots which seems to take ebdon bloody ages!!

[snookersaint]

It was the most important Snooker match of his life. He was just not trying to make any silly mistakes. The game was played in good spirit

[April madness]

To me he seemed to deliberately slow down, but, saying that, it was the FINAL of the WC, so it is difficult to judge from this particular match. If he really uses this "technique", he is going to do it again in other matches, so I guess I'll just wait and see before I make up my mind.

You mean it will show up only if he uses that deliberately? I could argue it could show up because that is a natural part of the game, he'd take his time to think about a shot every time before a tough shot. So how will you discriminate between these cases?

[nickdyr]

I found it very disturbing and to me it was obvious it was on purpose.
And it wasn´t always tough safetyshots, he did the same before potting black from the spot in perfect position.

And to say he was unlucky when they cut the third session short is hilarious, it was his own fault they didn´t make it on time!
And I am not convinced he would have won those frames without the slowplayning tacticts anyway.


Either it was deliberate or he is just a very slow thinker, and don´t know what´s worse...

[Alex0paul]

I actually think he is a slow player. In other matches he was pushing an average time of 30 seconds which is relatively slow but because of his 'story' in reaching the final he is more likely not be pulled up on this. However if it was Ebdon there would be a huge uproar of 'slow play', 'ruining the game', 'bad sportsmanship' and that I do not like.

[April madness]

Most of times when he had straightforward black on the spot, the cueball was on side cushion - the positional play was not perfect, so it wasn't easy shots for him anyway. And he missed some of those. I don't think he should be judged just for playing slowly (and don't think Ebdon did play slow on purpose, even I'm a big fan of Ronnie), everybody plays as fast as they can. No need to rush shots either.

[cueman]

I think I was one of the first to mention it and now I've spoken to a few people and reading about this now I'll tell you for sure he was deliberately playing slow.

When you have played the game to a good standard and you know the shots you can tell when a player is taking more time than necessary and I'm convinced he tried to get into John's head. There were a couple of instances where he had a straightforward safety, i.e. there wasn't another option but he took nearly 2 minutes on one and over a minute and a half on another and I could tell he was doing it on purpose. He did this when he was back in the match and he could see John was struggling a bit. You never saw him do this in any of his other matches, and I watched nearly every session!

Another reason I know this is because he is tactically very good, he has to be having won the 8 ball championships which is arguably more tactical than snooker. In that you get a maximum time of 1 minute per shot. Take that into equation I think its realistic that you only need up to 1 minute to play any shot in snooker, except perhaps for extremely tough snookers or safety shots that need a lot of thought, for example when the reds are very open but you can't pot one.

Whilst it wasn't quite Ebdon tactics, he was certainly playing slow in the deliberate attempt to upset Higgins. It worked for the most of the final session until John stepped it up.