2013 Masters discussion

[cebs]

Ding will be ok with these 2-2 , think this could go to the wire which would be nice.

BBC coverage is rubbish, problem with red button on freeview is only one stream and often it gets changed/bumped/wrong audio and no-one notices it for ages.

If you got unlimited broadband once it's not on bbc2, i'd go for the feed on the bbc website if you've got a way to stick it on your big screen that is. Other things is the bbc sports video feed isn't on the iplayer site or I don't think so again it limits you if you haven't got a smart device to stream it to your tv.

Nice feature now about the change to everyone playing from one but no mention of the china event that is unchanged.

[trains]

Note to John Virgo whining about flat 128's, Jimmy in the cubicles? Among 128 players Jimmy is ten a penny,Ronnie he isn't !!

[coomsey76]

So according to the BBC the only tournaments not going to a flat 128 are the World Championships and The Master, I thought there was being some tournaments in China not being touched like the Shanghai Masters......

[PatBlock]

BBC coverage is rubbish, problem with red button on freeview is only one stream and often it gets changed/bumped/wrong audio and no-one notices it for ages.

Yep, that's BBC production values for you.

Nice feature now about the change to everyone playing from one but no mention of the china event that is unchanged.

They're doing a feature on darts now.

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[cebs]

that last red was sweet.

good break from ding

[billabong]

So according to the BBC the only tournaments not going to a flat 128 are the World Championships and The Master, I thought there was being some tournaments in China not being touched like the Shanghai Masters......

The quote that got me was " look at the golf : Rory plays in every round doesn't he ? " LOL

Has anyone noticed as well that the glass / perspex behind the studio makes

Hazel, Stephen 7 Steve look as if they're in a hall of mirrors . . Can't stop looking at their reflections now instead of them . .

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[Odrl]

Snooker time again. :smile:

These breaks are quite easy to take these days, because we have major events every month, and the minor ones practically every week. Still, this feels like the first proper snooker since the UK Championship.

It's always interesting to see how this tournament plays out. Almost no one has produced strong runs in both the UK and The Masters in the last eight years, which is the period where the two tournaments are close together in the calendar. In fact, the vast majority of UK finalists have gone out in the 1st round of the Masters. I guess it's somewhat understandable... it's much easier to put your foot off the gas after a success, especially over the holiday period. On the other hand, players who disappoint in the UK will be determined to do something in the Masters.

The main thing about this tournament of course is the absence of qualifiers. They are almost always players in good form, whereas the seeds are in the tournament by default, so a few of them are bound to play poorly. The previous years also had players who were provisionally well out of the top16. With the new ranking system, this is supposed to be the 16 best players in the world at this point in time, and I guess it's not far off. In any case, all players have had some recent good performances, so there is no one to immediately rule out.

Let's see what the draw looks like...

Quarter 1:

Neil Robertson v. Ding Junhui
Mark Allen v. Mark Davis

The opening match is also the match of the round, Robertson against Ding, the last two winners of this event. It's not a particularly common pairing, so there shouldn't be any psychological edge either way. Although Robertson did of course prevail in their biggest match to date, the 2009 Grand Prix final. He generally does well in the best-of-11 format, and we've already had two of those this season, the International Championship and the UK Championship, where he reached a final and a QF respectively. He has somewhat improved his consistency in recent times, so I don't expect him to play as many bad tournaments as he used to, particularly here where there is a lot of money and prestige involved. On the other hand, Ding has become completely unpredictable. He had two early exits in the two biggest ranking events of the season so far, then won one of the PTCs after the UK Championship. I think he is one of the players who really need a good result here. It doesn't seem to matter what kind of draw he gets, if he plays poorly he will go out against a qualifier, and if he plays well no one is safe against him. He always seems to get a particularly tough draw here, having played Higgins, Murphy, Selby, Williams and O'Sullivan in the last five years, with mixed success. It's tough to call... I'm looking forward to this one. :smile:

Allen against Davis is an interesting one. On one hand, I get the feeling Allen could possibly win this tournament while Davis is a bit of an outsider, but on the other hand, Davis' recent results have been more impressive, particularly his consistency in reaching the business end of tournaments, and he's already beaten a few players of Allen's class this season. Reaching the semi-finals of the UK Championship was the highlight of his career so far, so what is next for him? Challenging for some ranking titles, or a return to mediocrity? I've already underestimated him a couple of times in the past, so I'll just wait and see this time. :smile: Mark Allen? Usually strong at the really big events, but slightly disappointing this season so far, although running into an in-form Trump early in tournaments doesn't help of course. I think his record in best-of-11 matches is quite poor, but that may just be a coincidence. I expect him to be tough to beat here. He is very tough to beat once he gets into his scoring rhythm, and at the same time he is tough to get rid of even when he goes a couple of frames behind. I think the table could also play its part here, as the Maters has ranged from very tight to very generous tables in recent years, and Mark Allen usually does very well on the latter.

Looking past the 1st round, Allen against either Ding or Robertson would be very interesting. It would be Allen's and Robertson's third meeting in a row at the Masters, each having won one previously. Allen and Ding also had a bit of a rivalry a couple of seasons ago, but have since mostly avoided each other in tournaments. As I remember, Allen has had more success, so I think he would probably prefer Ding to Robertson. If Davis goes through it should be equally interesting. Ding and Robertson both have a point to prove against him, as he knocked both of them out of their home tournaments a couple of months ago. Davis is the home player here, so they will be looking to return the favour. It's tough to pick one, but I'll go for Ding here.

Quarter 2:

Shaun Murphy v. Ricky Walden
John Higgins v. Allister Carter

Well, Murphy is the UK finalist, so out he goes. :smile: Should be a good match. Walden prevailed in their best-of-11 match at the UK in 2011, before Murphy got some revenge in the following months. He seems to be going out early quite often these days, but also has some good runs, which is quite different to his consistency from a couple of seasons ago where you always expected him in the semi-finals. It's now been over four years since he last won a major title, but he's reached the UK, the Masters and the WC finals since, so he is still a contender for the biggest titles. With the decline of the O'Sullivan generation, and not that many young players coming through, it must be frustrating for the likes of Murphy and Maguire not being able to take advantage, while players like Hawkins and Bingham are winning their first titles pretty late in their career. On the other hand, Ricky Walden has taken advantage, winning his second ranking title this season and securing a rare appearance at the Masters. He went out in the 1st round at the UK, so I'm sure he will be determined to win a match or two here.

John Higgins could also be in danger, as this seems to be the tournament where he is most vulnerable, with a bunch of early exits over the years. He's often come to this event on the back of a good UK performance, but not this year, with early exits in both the International and the UK Championships. On the plus side, he has a good record against Carter. They've not played all that often, but Higgins did prevail in the matches I can remember, twice at the Welsh Open and this season in Shanghai. They've also met very recently in the Championship League, Higgins winning again, but that was only a best-of-5 match. Carter seems to have got back to somewhere near his best form, with strong runs in the WC and the UK in 2012, but I'm sure he would rather forget the way he lost his UK semi-final, losing 9-8 from 8-4 up. There is always a chance that could set him back for a while, and he could be lacking in confidence here, particularly playing against a player he can't seem to beat. It would be interesting to see a rematch of Murphy-Carter, but I have a feeling Higgins will play a decent tournament and go through here.

Quarter 3:

Mark Selby v. Stuart Bingham
Mark Williams v. Matthew Stevens

Another interesting quarter. The focus will be on Mark Selby, another player with the difficult task of following up on his good UK performance. On one hand, the pressure will be off somewhat now that he's finally won another major title (and added a PTC as well), but at the same time he is now one of the men to beat again, and that's something he's never really enjoyed. He did very well on his first couple of appearances in this tournament, then had a couple of disappointing years. Is it time for things to turn around again? Bingham is always a tricky opponent these days, one of the better performers in the first half of the season. It took a good Carter to knock him out of the UK, and it's surely going to take another strong player to take him out here. He struggled a bit after the new year last season, so it wouldn't surprise me if his form dropped again. After all, it seems to happen to every top player these days anyway.

Williams and Stevens are also pretty tough to predict here. Williams has been very poor this season, particularly in the biggest tournaments. He also seems to have lost his edge in the overseas tournaments recently, with a bunch of early exits, the semi-final in Shanghai his only good run since the start of last season. Unless I'm forgetting something, he hasn't won a big tournament in the UK for ten years, although it's pretty tough these days, with so few left. I think it's about time for his form to return. Selby and Bingham are the two players to beat him in the first two ranking finals of last season, both coming back from behind to win in deciding frames, which must have been pretty demoralizing for him. But Williams does have a pretty good record against Selby, so he will be confident he can go through, as long as he is playing well himself. I'm not ruling Stevens out either. He seems to have accepted that role of a player who is ranked somewhere towards the end of the top16, and generally wins a match or two, but never really gets all that close to winning a title. He has always played well in the biggest tournaments, something that has returned recently, after another semi-final at the WC. Stevens could go far if neither of the two big players play their best here, otherwise I think it's between Selby and Williams.

Quarter 4:

Stephen Maguire v. Graeme Dott
Judd Trump v. Barry Hawkins

I like this last quarter and I expect the winner of it to challenge strongly for the title this week. First of all, two players who are still looking for a big result this season, Maguire and Dott. Before the UK Championship I said that Maguire usually does something in either the UK or the Masters, maybe a solid semi-final if nothing else. He went out early in the UK, so I guess it's the Masters this time. :smile: He is in the same position as Shaun Murphy, waiting a long time for another ranking title, even though he is supposed to be in his prime. He got very close in Germany and China last season, only just losing in both finals, and he's played some excellent snooker at times. Can he finally put together four solid matches in a row? Dott usually struggles at the Masters, going out in the early rounds, including a 6-5 defeat to Maguire in the 1st round in 2009. He reached a PTC final a couple of weeks back, so he knows good form isn't far away. Perhaps that will give him some confidence for a decent run here.

Judd Trump is possibly the man to beat here, already a major title to his name this season, and probably a lot of determination after a pretty underwhelming defeat in the 1st round of the UK. It's hard to perform at your best for several tournaments in a row, but it works both ways, so I don't really expect Trump to follow a bad tournament with another one here. He came to this event as the UK Champion last season and reached the semi-finals, making him one of the few exceptions. I think he will enjoy this format and the atmosphere again, although he has been known to crack under pressure when there was too much expectation on him. It could be the case again now that O'Sullivan is not playing, as the British audience usually gets behind a player of that style, and there's not many others like him here this week. As for Hawkins, I'm sure no one really expected him to suddenly become a major contender after his win in Australia. He drew Trump in the 1st round of the very next tournament, which just shows how tough it is to string together a couple of good results, particularly for a player like Hawkins. He is a very solid player, but always second favourite against the second seed here.

This is another quarter where the 2nd round match could be a good one, particularly if it's Trump against Maguire. Some of the possible pairings are quite common here. I'm sure Dott will be hoping to avoid Trump after that thrashing in the 2011 WC. Maguire and Hawkins also played in that WC, Hawkins winning 10-9 in the 1st round, so Maguire still has a score to settle with Hawkins. But as I said, it's Maguire-Trump which would be the dream match here, and possibly a very high obstacle for Trump to overcome. Maguire has a very good record over him, some wins from the time when Trump was still a qualifier, and some more recent as well. Trump's big win over Maguire was in the 2011 UK of course, so it's not like he's never beaten him before, but he knows he can't rely on any psychological edge over Maguire. I think this match will happen, and I think it could be high quality, with Maguire perhaps going through.

Possible semi-final lineup:

Ding Junhui v. John Higgins
Mark Williams v. Stephen Maguire


So there we are, well underway now, with the time it took to type all this. Should be a good week. :smile:

[coomsey76]

The quote that got me was " look at the golf : Rory plays in every round doesn't he ? " LOL

That is very true, Rory does play in the first round but in front of a crowd like all the other first round players do...... a little different to playing a first round match in a cubical or a sports hall!!

But like most changes there a plus and minus to everything.... and not everybody will like it, but at least its giving a chance to new blood in the game!!

Anyway back to the discussion in hand.....

[billabong]

It's just such a bad comparison, since in golf the score is taken over all 4 rounds .

How could the top 16 golfers join on day 2 ???

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[coomsey76]

Very true, I do totally agree with you!!

[billabong]

Very true, I do totally agree with you!!

You looking forward to an early exit for your man on Wednesday ?

Come on Matthew get it done -----------------------------------

[SouthPaw]

Oh dear my signed picture looks very unlikely , Neil has strangely caught clinchers disease in his past few events...

[trains]

I'd like to see ranking event qualifiers be increased from 9 to 11 frames like here,the first to 6 feels more complete.

[coomsey76]

You looking forward to an early exit for your man on Wednesday ?

Come on Matthew get it done -----------------------------------

Never...... I have a feeling Mark is going to hit a bit of form!!

[coomsey76]

So Robertson keeps himself in it with a century.......

But how did that red go in down the cushion???