19.12.08

WELSH OPEN NEWS

Mark Williams, Matthew Stevens and Dominic Dale will have their final qualifying round matches in the Welsh Open held over to the final stages.

This means there will be at least four Welshmen at the Newport Centre as Ryan Day is seeded through as world no.8.

This strikes me as a sensible move. If you want spectators to come along it helps if there are local players in action.

I suspect the players will agree - all three have had problems getting through from Prestatyn this season and are more at home in the TV set up.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

good decision

Anonymous said...

This is certainly a sensible move commercially. But is it fair towards the other qualifiers?

Anonymous said...

as long as they have notice id say yes. its not being done for those guys to gain advantage (know you were not saying that) so imo its the correct choice to hopefully get bums on seats. bums on seats means.....well less bums not on seats

Dave H said...

In fairness to World Snooker it is not always easy to balance what is 'fair' with what is 'right'

I'd say they have done the right thing here

Anonymous said...

i agree dave. not easy but imo correct, though they will need to treat future events similarly too

Anonymous said...

european open/malta cup/whatever used to let tony drago play TWO qualifying rounds at the main arena... which was probably also the right thing to do.

Anonymous said...

Paul Davies must be fuming.

Anonymous said...

Good decision as I don't believe it's too unfair to anyone when some qualifying matches are played in Newport instead of Prestatyn.

I think it's more unfair to force players into an extra wildcard round at some Asian tournaments although these players had already qualified for the main draw.

cheers,
Eric

Anonymous said...

Good decision- well done World Snooker.
John H

Anonymous said...

I agree - another decent decision.

lightning strikes twice?

If they can hold matches over for other ranking events why not wales?

Anonymous said...

As a Williams fan I like the decision.

Anonymous said...

What if another welsh player gets through from first round qualies to the same round as williams stevens etc? Do they get to play at newport or are they stuck in prestatyn?? That wouldn't seem fair....