John Sutton banned for six years

15:52:00 Ramona Dragomir 0 Comments

The World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA) has reached its verdict regarding John Sutton' situation and things aren't looking too great for the snooker player as he got a six-year ban and has to pay £5,000, after being found guilty of match-fixing.

On 24th of September 2014 during the qualifying stages of the International Championship John Sutton lost 6-0 to Jamie Burnett, while suspicious betting patterns were reported.

This resulted in Sutton's suspension on February 9th 2015, while the WPBSA started a "thoroughly investigation into match betting patters" and in April  he was found guilty to "be in breaks of rule 2.1.2 and 2.1.3 of the WBPSA's Members Rule".

At that particular time the WPBSA's Chairman Mr Jason Ferguson announced there will be another hearing as to establish what the sanction will be.

Today, the WPBSA's press release states that the 34-year old player from Ireland is banned for six years from the game of snooker and has to pay £5,000. 

His suspension from playing snooker will be dated starting from February 9th 2015 (when he was first suspended pending the hearing of establishing a sanction) and will end on February 9th 2021.

Mr Jason Ferguson: “We take no pride in having to deal with such serious issues, however this demonstrates our commitment to ensuring ALL World Snooker events are competed in a fair and honest manner. 

Working closely with our many international partners, the WPBSA has developed the strongest anti-corruption strategies available in sport today. 

John Sutton was an amateur player, he does not a hold a main tour card and this case is evidence of the strong global governance we adopt in the sport of snooker.

Sutton maintains his innocence and declare: "The only thing I am guilty of is being an ill-prepared amateur." for BBC Sport.

The Irishmen suspension is not a singular fact in the world of snooker, back in 2013 Stephen Lee getting an even harder sanction of 12 years, after being found guilty of match-fixing.

The WPBSA full statement regarding John Sutton can be read here.
 

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Happy birthday Stuart Bingham!

16:14:00 Ramona Dragomir 0 Comments

We are over-joyed to wish the reigning world champion, Stuart "Ball-run" Bingham "Happy birthday"!!!

Bingham is turning 39 today, just 17 days days after lifting the World Championship trophy by defeating Shaun Murphy in a brilliant final, 18-15.

Many happy returns champ and hope to see you conquer even more titles in the coming season! SML blog will be watching you! :-))


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Happy birthday John Higgins!

13:30:00 Ramona Dragomir 0 Comments

Today we are celebrating the four-time world champion John Higgins who is turning 40!!! 

SML blog we would like to wish him all the best and of course to see him lift as many trophies as possible. 

The snooker aficionados already know the fact that Higgins kept himself into a bit of a shadow for the past seasons, but managed to reach the surface once he won the 2015 Welsh Open.

Hopefully this marks the comeback of "The Wizard of Wishaw" (ask Stephen Hendry how to pronounced that correctly, for he's the only one who knows) and we shall see more of that tremendous cue-action of his in the following season.

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2015 World Championship (the Final) - Brilliant Bingham crowned World Champion

02:13:00 Ramona Dragomir 0 Comments

Stuart Bingham beat Shaun Murphy 18-15 to win this year's Betfred.com World Championship trophy after a long and hard journey of 17 days in Sheffield to which you also must add his 20 years of playing professional snooker.

The tremendous cue action from the Crucible arena bares the name of a single man and that man is Stuart Bingham - the newly crowned King of the Crucible. 

The underdog, the player that many disregarded for years, the one who finally proved that "nice guys do win" as Steve Davis himself declared.

The final against the 2005 world champion Shaun Murphy started as a very balanced cues-crossing affair, the first session ending on a tight 4-4, but the second one was seeing the Smurf taking a tiny advantage of 9-8.

Still, Bingham managed to turn tables against his opponent during the third session (ended on 14-11), a session that dare I say, won him the match in one way or another.

As the lads returned for their final encounter, tension was in the air. Nothing seemed like before and every shot carried that extra baggage of ”this could be the one".

The opening frame was a scrappy affair, but it didn't matter for Murphy as runs of 33 and 28 were helping him start his comeback. Or maybe not?

Bingham responded with a great 102 to go 15-12 up, but once again Murphy pushed his luck with a brilliant 77 clearance to win back a frame and a 64 to go just one behind at the interval.

A top break of 42 was made responsible for making the scoreline go 15-15, but the next frame was proving an epic one, a genuine display of safety shots, snookers, bad misses, penalty points from Shaun to Stuart (about 36 to be more precise), bad luck and bottle.

After 64 minutes of hard work Bingham prevailed the test of the Crucible while a break of 59 in frame 32 was helping him go just one away from victory.

Murphy's concentration and long potting faded even more, Bingham closing the match with an 88 break for a tremendous and well-deserved victory.

The traditional punch in the air was performed at the end, as well as the warm hug received from a genuine sportsman who stood there and applauded his opponent. And it's not an easy task, especially when you've just lost.

An emotional Bingham received the trophy and posed with his family and friends, in the standing ovation of a amazing Crucible crowd. 

The champion said that this "unbelievable" victory "means everything to him" and ended with his trademark "winner, winner chicken dinner". 

I don't know why by Bingham's victory reminds me of the one Joe Johnson recorded back in 1986 in front of Steve Davis. A very nice player and person who no one believed could end up winning it, but proved everyone wrong.

This concludes our 17 magical days of Crucible drama and puts an end of another season of snooker. Needless to say how thrilling it has been and how much I've personally enjoyed sharing snooker with you all.

Here's for another season! Oh ... and congratulation to our new champion of the world - Stuart Bingham! I guess we'll be talking about the Crucible Curse in 12 month time ...
 

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2015 World Championship (the Final) - Bingham turns tables

18:58:00 Ramona Dragomir 0 Comments

The 2015 Betfred.com World Championship final is underway and at this precisely moment (hoping you are not reading this on Tuesday or 10 years from now, because it will make little sense) Stuart Bingham has managed to turn the tables against Shaun Murphy and get himself into the leading position, 14-11.

After a first session that finished on a draw (4-4), Shaun Murphy got a 9-8 lead at the end of the second, but Bingham was going to change that in a blink of an eye (cliché alert!).

A break of 87 was responsible for drawing level, while a really easy missed red from Shaun down on 23, permitted Bingham to come to the table for a 51 in order to take the lead for the first time since the beginning of the final.

Frame 20 could have been an important page in snooker's history book, for Stuart was on a roll for making a maximum break (hard to believe but no one had ever scored a 147 in the final of the World Championship), but he got very unlucky in getting position for the last red and the break ended on 112.

One more frame was added to Bingham's generous collection with a half-a-century break, thus the scoreboard showing a 12-9 scoreline at the mid-session interval. Worrying times for the Smurf!

Still, as the lads retuned into the arena, a quarter of an hour later, Murphy managed to pull back a frame with a top break of 59 which got as a reply as determined 87 from Bingham. This wasn't going to be easy!

One more time Murphy got into the balls and fired an 84 break to reduce his deficit, but as before Bingham fought back and retained the three-frame lead with a top break of 57.

So, at 14-11 Stuart Bingham looks favourite to win especially since he only needs four more frames and he's cueing beautifully, but bare in mind the fact that Murphy is an ex-world champion with a lot of stamina and a tremendous season of snooker. 

This isn't going to be easy and we might just see a decider here, but whatever the result this is by far, one of the greatest World Championship's finals.

Boys will come back for their final session at 7pm (UK time). May the best man win!

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2015 World Championship (the Final) - Murphy leads Bingham overnight

01:02:00 Ramona Dragomir 0 Comments

The first two sessions of the 2015 Betfred.com World Championship's final are over and Shaun Murphy is the one who holds a slight advantage of 9-8 over his brother in arms, Stuart Bingham.

The Crucible arena welcomed the two players into a thunderstorm of applause and cheers, because for two days the only play that will be staged here is going to be “Snooker history in the making”.

As expected, both Shaun and Stuart played some terrific snooker and maybe just because it was the first day, there wasn't so much tension in the air. Or better say, they played like this was just another match, focusing on potting one ball at a time. But that will soon change.

Murphy was the first one in, breaks of 68, 59 and 65 winning him the first three frames of the opening session, while Bingham could only respond with a 105 to enter the mid-session interval being led 3-1.

After the mini-break of tea, scones, biscuits and whatever, Bingham added one more frame to his collection, only to see Murphy respond with a solid break of 90 points.

But Stu didn't panic and grabbed the last two frames with a top break of 65 to make the scoreline go 4-4.

At returning into the arena for their second session, Murphy was once again the dominant figure for the first part of the snooker rendez-vous, a magnificent set of breaks (74, 106, 121 and 51) helping him capture four consecutive frames.

It must be said that his opponent had a terrific chance to put his nose in front right at the beginning of the session when he made a break of 57, but a missed red proved quite costly in the end.

However, as the mid-session interval was over, so was Murphy's regime. Bingham fought back like a veritable lion, breaks of 76, 123 and 89 putting him just one behind, at 8-7.

NOTE: 

Murphy's 121 break represented the tournament's 83rd century break, thus equalizing the record established in 2009 at the Crucible.

Bingham's 123 break, on the other hand, is actually the one that beats the aforementioned record and establishes a new one. That's the standard of today's game!

Aaaand now let's get back to our match.

Shaun woken up just in time to record a break of 76 and re-open the two-frame gap, but the session ended 9-8 as Bingham scored a 53 to give us all a hint of how close this final is going to be.

As you all know Monday is the final day and with two more sessions to be played it's still hard to predict a winner, or a winning scoreline, but one thing is guaranteed: these guys will fight until the last ball needs to be potted (even if it's the black ball and it's way past midnight).

2pm
Shaun Murphy v. Stuart Bingham (3rd session)

7pm
Shaun Murphy v. Stuart Bingham (last session) 

*all hours are UK time 
 

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2015 World Championship (Day 15) - Grand Final welcomes Murphy & Bingham

04:14:00 Ramona Dragomir 0 Comments

After two weeks of intensive cue action, drama, laughter, emotions and fighting guts the time has come to get to the last stage of our Crucible journey. And for Shaun Murphy and Stuart Bingham that means - the Grand Final.

For the blog readers or those of you acquainted with what happens at the 2015 World Championship, it's really no surprise to see Shaun Murphy reaching the final, taking into account the fact that he led Barry Hawkins 6-2, 13-3 and 16-8.

The last session started with a great effort from "The Hawk", a break of 103 winning him a frame, but Murphy was sure to end businesses as soon as possible and cleared the table with an 83 break in frame 26, for a final 17-9 scoreline.

After the match "The Magician" Murphy shared his thoughts about the recent year and remembered his poor form from the past years.

"It was though to see everyone else doing great", said Shaun who admitted that winning the Masters at the beginning of this year was a great boost of confidence.

Although "blown away” by his recent victory over Barry Hawkins, Murphy didn't find any shame it saying that there were times when he didn't believe in himself anymore and that it took a lot of work to "mature" into the person and player that he is today.

On a funnier note though, he refused to reveal what his new outfit will be. Tough cookie this one!

Barry Hawkins stated that tiredness (which is perfectly normal after playing for two weeks) had nothing to do with him losing the semi-final, but rather the fact that his opponent outplayed him.

A very emotional Barry chocked with tears when he tried to thank his manager Paul Mount for everything that he did for him and snooker.

For those of you unaware, Mr Mount waited for the end of his players’ contract (which coincides with the end of the season) to put an official stop to what in my opinion is in fact the end of an era for snooker and those involved in it.

You can find more details about this matter in this interview with Mr Paul Mount conducted by Matt from Pro Snooker Blog.

Stuart Bingham and Judd Trump finished their snooker "quarrel" in the best possible way: through a decider.

Bingham has always been the man in front, ending the first session 5-3 up and continuing with 9-7, but when the third one kicked off it was Trump who started firing pressure shots on his opponent.

Breaks of 61 and 91 proved enough to make the scoreline more appetizing for Judd (9-9), but Stuart was sure to win no less than four frames in a row with runs of 67, 62, 35 and 59 and fly 13-9 up.

A very dramatic frame was the 23rd one which lasted for more than half an hour, Bingham giving an amount of 24 penalty points to his rival who went on and won the frame on the pink.

Trump was also adding another frame to his slightly poor collection in order to close the session the same way that he started it: by being two frames behind (13-11).

The evening came quite quickly and so the boys re-entered into a raucous arena packed with fans hungry for drama and entertainment. Luckily for them, that was on the menu.

Bingham was the first in and managed to extend his lead, but Trump responded with a perfect set of breaks (88, 50 and 44) to win back two consecutive frames.

The 77th century break of the tournament was going to push Stuart 15-13 up, but once again a tenacious Trump replayed by winning the following frame with a break of 76.

It felt like raining with century breaks, especially after Bingham hit an 102 one to go one away from victory, while his opponent developed a powerful counter attack with breaks like 108 and 129! Decider it is then!

Bingham had the first chance but missed the blue early in the frame, Judd coming to the table but quickly missing a red due to a kick. It took Bingham quite some time to close the match, but runs of 27 and 19 did the trick in the end.

All teary and extremely emotional, Stuart Bingham described his victory as "unbelievable" and added that "This is 20 years of blood, sweat and tears".

So this is it snooker lovers! The Grand Final starts this Sunday and by Monday evening we shall be seeing a new … or old champion.

It's been 10 years since Shaun Murphy was crowned world champion and it's been way too many years since Stuart Bingham set his mind to be world champion, so it's a 50/50 chance.

SML blog will like to wish best of luck to both players and … let the fun begin!

2pm 
Shaun Murphy v. Stuart Bingham (1st session) 

7pm 
Shaun Murphy v. Stuart Bingham (2nd session) 

*all hours are UK time 

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Happy birthday Jimmy White!

13:30:00 Ramona Dragomir 0 Comments


The semi-finals of this year's World Championship are keeping us on tenterhooks, but we just can't overlook the birthday of a very dear, dear snooker player - Jimmy White!

"The Whirlwind" is turning 53 today and SML blog would like to wish him all the best and many, many happy returns.

Keep on potting them balls, champ!

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2015 World Championship (Day 14) - Magic Murphy ready for final

03:49:00 Ramona Dragomir 0 Comments

Hello there my dearies! Today I bring you news from the wonderland of snooker (aka. Crucible just in case you've forgotten) where Shaun Murphy is just one step away from reaching the final.

The Smurf, whose form is just spectacular, is currently leading Barry Hawkins by an amazing 16-8 scoreline.

It was crystal clear right from the end of the first session who was the strongest player, Murphy closing with a 6-2 advantage over a devastated Hawkins. 

But when the second session kicked off this Friday we'd hoped to see a more revived Hawk in action. In wasn't going to be the case. At least not in this session.

Shaun was the first one in breaks of 73, 105 (which was the 70th of the tournament; just pause for a moment here and say wow! thank you, let's carry on now), 79 and 72 to win no less than FOUR frames in a row and fly at 10-2 up. Brilliant!

Hawkins found himself in a very dark place, but still managed to grab the 13th frame with a great 79 clearance. Still, by the end of the session, Murphy was rocking around the snooker table thanks to breaks like 121, 38 and 54 for a 13-3 lead.

No turning back from this one! We even thought this might end on Friday evening and Murphy would have a session to spare the next day, but boy were we wrong!

Despite Murphy's early contribution which came under the form of runs of 32 and 26, as the third session started to develop it was easy to see something had changed in the way Barry was approaching basically everything. 

And for a moment there I think he didn't mind the scoreline and just went for it. What a great effort it was!

Breaks of 103, 57, 104 and 73 were winning him FOUR frames in a row (deja-vu anyone?) making the scoreboard show a 14-7 scoreline.

Still, the magic that surrounds Shaun (I'm not quite sure if it's because of those fancy suits of him or just because he's playing awesome snooker) kicked back with breaks of 83 and 106 to go just one away from victory.

It looked like despite Hawkins’s efforts this was going to end. Until Murphy overcut a red down on 22, Barry coming down to the table and making a 76 break to keep the match alive, as well as his hopes for a comeback this Saturday.

All odds are against it, but one never knows!

Another two snooker gladiators crossed their cues for another session this Friday, Stuart Bingham managing to maintain his leadership of two frames over Judd Trump, 9-7.

The lads re-started their match with Bingham in the lead (5-3) a break of 52 offering him an ever bigger advantage before his dangerous opponent could resist his dominance.

Trump used breaks of 113 and 63 to pull back two frames, but Stuart broke his momentum with a 67 to enter the mid-session interval leading 7-5.

After the 15-minutes break Bingham returned into the arena and quickly added one more frame to his collection, but the Bristolian fought back with a top break of 45 to restore the two-frame disadvantage.

One more time Bingham tried (and succeeded) to detach himself from his opponent even further, a break of 85 proving quite handy in his case, but Trump was sure to respond with a 64 in order to trail 9-7.

Saturday will see the conclusion of these two matches, so be sure to clear your schedule, for the ones who win will go straight into the grand final.

10am
Judd Trump v. Stuart Bingham (7-9)

2.30pm
Shaun Murphy v. Barry Hawkins (16-8)

7pm
Judd Trump v. Stuart Bingham (last session)

*all hours are UK time 

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2015 World Championship (Day 13) - Murphy & Bingham take lead

03:07:00 Ramona Dragomir 0 Comments

The first session of the mighty 2015 World Championship semi-finals took place today in a packed Crucible theatre arena with only one majestic table to play balls on.

The thrill was amplified by the fact that all the four remaining contestants realise the magnitude of what's happening now and that all eyes are on them. There is no turning back, there is no room for mistakes, for this is the last stop before the grand finale.

First match: Shaun Murphy v. Barry Hawkins. Here things looked something like this: Murphy made his appearance in a blue & red outfit and wearing Al Capone look-alike shoes while Barry adopted a more conservator style of a white shirt and a light-blue waistcoat.

Snooker related though, the man wearing the dandy shoes was also the one who dominated the session.

Murphy started with a brilliant 92 break to take the opening frame and when his opponent broke down on 63 after missing a red, he was there to capitalize with a 44 clearance to go 2-0 up.

Runs of 38, 23 and 29 were helping the same Murphy get one more frame, while the last before the interval had written "insane" all over it! 

A bit scrappy, but a great display of safety shots the 4th frame saw the lads stuck at 51-53 (in favour of Barry) with only the black left on the table.

Funnily enough though, Shaun potted that black along with the cue ball, thus granting the frame to an embarrassed Hawkins. 

After the 15-minutes break the Smurf extended his lead by recording the first century break of the semi-finals (105), but Hawkins responded with a 69 to trail 4-2.

Clearly still feeling Wednesday's night fatigue (when he ended up playing those thrilling frames against Neil Robertson), Hawkins was a bit out of touch with the re-clothed table, while Murphy was flying 6-2 up by hitting in breaks of 138 and 79.

The evening brought with it two more wonderful players, Judd Trump and Stuart Bingham starting their snooker battle.

Until the mid-session interval (ended on 2-2) the lads went hand-in-hand, sharing frames and entertaining the audience with their snooker skills.

But as soon as they returned from their cabins, Bingham was the one who shoot the first bullet, breaks of 49 and 74 putting him 4-2 ahead.

It must be said that Judd had a terrific chance in frame six, but a missed red on 56 gave his opponent the chance to go two frames ahead.

Still, the powerful Bristolian captured himself the 7th frame with a 75 break before the session was closed with a 76 signed by Bingham who is now the proud owner of a 5-3 lead.

More tension, drama and fashion display to come our way ...

10am
Shaun Murphy v. Barry Hawkins (6-2)

2.30pm
Judd Trump v. Stuart Bingham (3-5)

7pm
Shaun Murphy v. Barry Hawkins (3rd session)

*all hours are UK time
 

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