29.10.08

QUESTIONS, QUESTIONS

We will (hopefully) soon be recording the first, some say historic, Snooker Scene podcast.

Thanks for all your suggestions as to what Clive Everton, Phil Yates and myself should talk about.

I have decided to throw it open to snooker fans and therefore ask you all to send us some questions you would like answered.

We will then pick some of the best ones and endeavour to answer them.

Please either leave your questions as a comment below or email them to snookersceneblog@aol.com.

It would be help if you left your (first) name and where you are from.

Many thanks.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

I would be interested to hear the three of you discuss Ronnie O'Sullivan's recent comment made live on the BBC after beating Wenbo about "doing an Ebdon". I'd also like to hear your thoughts on the prior situation to which the quote relates as well as the repurcussions that there have been or may follow because of this.

Thanks.

Anonymous said...

Should the game be made "open" to allcomers again, as was the case in the early 90s? There seems to be a distinct lack of fresh faces and overseas players on the main tour.

Anonymous said...

John (Cumbria)

We often hear comments about the very fast Number 10 cloths the pro's play on. (The match tables in Glasgow were said by Steve Davis to be the fastest he'd played on).

Why (to my knowledge) is there no equivalent of golf's Stimptmeter used on the pro circuit. This simple device could be used to provide standardisation across cloths and cushion bounces. It would also allow club players to compare the speed of their own tables to those on TV and provide empirical data that would be useful to TV commentators.

Anonymous said...

I would be intrested to hear your thoughts on Stephen Hendry's game at the moment and in particular if You think he is still capable of winning an 8th world title.If not do you think O'Sullivan could equal or even break his record?
Padraig,Ireland

Anonymous said...

Personally, I find the miss rule very irritating. The imprecision implicit in a referee's attempt to replace snooker balls is anathema to the exacting nature of the game, and I have a proposal that would put an end to it. It goes a bit like this:

If player A is deemed to made an unsatisfactory attempt to escape from a snooker, then player B should be given a free ball (irrespective of whether or not he can see both sides of the ball on).

I think this would sufficiently punish player A, without requiring the referee to replace snooker balls, because even if player B could not easily pot a ball or play a good safety, he could force player A to play again. So, there seems no way that player A would be advantaged by deliberately failing to escape from the snooker.

My understanding is that the miss rule was invented in order to prevent players from deliberately failing to escape from a snooker, but in practice, I don't remember this actually happening (at least in the professional game).

What do Phil, Clive, et. al. think of the miss rule and my suggestion above?

- Donal, Montreal

Anonymous said...

I would like to know what have been the "best" and "worst" moments for the three of you during your commentary stints

best/worst can of course be funniest and/or most embarrassing!

Clive's falling off the chair episode is excluded from Clive's answer!

I can think of a couple of other incidents that stick in the memory.

one was Clive having to do the famous "chicken walk" at the uk in Bournemouth

and if I remember rightly Phil once did a long stint in a rather warm commentary box with a rapidly melting mars bar in his pocket!

andy said...

I'd like to see you use a tool like drop.io, see The Daily Source Code drop as a good example of how this tool can be used for podcasting.

Listeners can help contribute to the show with voice comments, vids, links to relevant material etc via the drop.

Andy

Anonymous said...

I agree with what Donal said above about the miss rule- I don't think referees should have to "judge" either a miss, or where the balls were, and I think it should be abolished.

What about a rule that punished an accumulation of misses? For example, if a player makes 3 failures to hit a "ball on", then the incoming player gets some benefit, a free ball for example. This would remove the need for ball replacement. The offending player would concede the penalty points (and any free ball), plus 1 "miss" would be recorded; when this miss figure reaches 3, the incoming player gets some kind of benefit (a free "push" might be worth exploring, where the player has the option to strike the cue ball to a more advantageous area of the table, and continue playing).

The only issue I can foresee is that tactical "deliberate misses" will gain some level of acceptance.

What do you think Dave, Clive & Phil?

Anonymous said...

Well maybe my questions are not as good as others, but how about:

What was your first memory of Cue Sports and what's your highest break?

Anonymous said...

Having been in the game 28 years now pehaps you can discuss/explain too me why the WSA have never invested long term in junior grass roots - the games future.

The WSA Academy is fine for the few that players that can afford it in time and money.

All other sports invest time/money in schools and junior activities.

Malc Thorne

Anonymous said...

Whatever you do you'll have to be careful not to leave the magazine redundant.
All the results etc are available easily on the web and this blog provides nearly all the gossip any fan could need.
That doesn't leave much room for a magazine to thrive in a dwindling market.