They (whoever 'they' are) say that if you fail to prepare then you should prepare to fail.
Ronnie O'Sullivan would seem to agree with this assessment after his disappointing first round exit at the 12bet.com UK Championship earlier this month.
O'Sullivan puts his 9-6 defeat to Stuart Bingham down to a lack of preparation, in particular his snubbing of all but two of the Players Tour Championship events.
“I was disappointed with my performance in Telford, which was due to lack of match practice," he said.
"I always practice really hard but I need to play in more of the smaller tournaments to improve my sharpness. I go into every tournament wanting to win, but on the day it's down to the hard work you've done in advance”
This is true, even for a player as talented as Ronnie. Part of his preparation for next month's Ladbrokes Mobile Masters will thus be two days play in the Championship League against some of the very best players in the game, including world champion Neil Robertson.
The standard this season has been extremely high due to the fact that so many players are match sharp.
Hours in the club are important but what really toughens a player up is playing in a match that actually means something: that has money and/or ranking points attached.
The PTCs and Championship League may pass below the radar for many but they have a vital part to play, which is why so many top players have embraced them.
7 comments:
So Ron has seen the error of his ways.
Is it April fools yet ?
More like Ron Sr has laid down the law to him. I bet he wasn't too impressed to come out of the clink and see Ronnie get knocked out in the first round.
when will everyone realise its not about Ronnie.
?
take out the ptc results and hes still well down the rankings
hes not the best player in the world
he may be able to play to the highest level, but he cant do it for a whole match, never mind a tournamnt these days
ALL EXCLUDING THE SET UP FOR RONNIE SHOT CLOCK EVENT
how about ignoring he exists for a while and focussing on JH, NR and SM until Ronnie wins a normal tournament?
Yeah we all remember the Bingham match and Ron hitting balls at 100 mph when he fully well knows the pockets are NOT going to accept them.
That's as close to a white flag as you can get in this game.
The preparation aspect is probably true but O'Sullivan's comments after his defeat to Bingham seemed irrelevant. He didn't go down guns blazing that day. He got behind or realized that Stuart was playing well and lost total interest in the match which has happened numerous times before. I love to watch Ronnie play but that match would have been much closer had he not shut down.
Let it's hope Ronnie's dad has persuaded to play well and get on with it. How much will the winner for the 2011 Ladbrokes Mobile Masters? Also any news on any other tournaments going to be broadcast on ITV4, BBC,
£150 grand for the winner.looks like the bbc are trying to drop events not show more.
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