Ding Junhui's Incredible 2013/14 Season – Throwback

It’s quite the accomplishment whenever a player is able to win a ranking event, especially nowadays when competition is higher than ever before. Which makes it more impressive when players are successful in capturing multiple ranking titles within a season. However, there are a handful of elite individuals that prospered in their respective seasons to break barriers and secure (at least) five ranking titles in a single season. And we’re going to Throwback to one of them.

These individuals include: Stephen Hendry in 1990/91; Mark Selby in 2016/17; Ronnie O’Sullivan in 2017/18; and most recently, Judd Trump in 2019/20. On this occasion, we’re going to look at the second person to achieve this feat back in the 2013/14 season – Enter the Dragon, Ding Junhui.

Prior to this season, Ding had a rocky couple of years but he wasn’t in a complete drought. Despite winning the Welsh Open in 2012, most of Ding’s performances during the rest of that season resulted in early exits. Things got slightly better in the 2012/13 season as he won the PTC and reached a couple more quarters and semi-finals. But we were all still wondering when Ding would really hit his stride.

There had only been two ranking events of the 2013/14 season as we reached September for the Shanghai Masters. Ding had confident victories over his opponents, which included Murphy, Robertson and Hawkins as he cruised to his first of many ranking titles that season with final victory over wildcard, Xiao Guodong. This would be the first of Ding’s three consecutive ranking final appearances – and I’m guessing you know what the results end up being.

Approximately three weeks later, we were introduced to the first Indian Open. Even though the final was contested over a best-of-9 format, Ding still had reasonable competition in the forms of Joyce, Higgins and Robertson. His 5-0 victory over home favourite, Aditya Mehta meant that Ding was the first person since O’Sullivan in 2003 to win back-to-back ranking events in a single season.

Just over one week following the Indian Open, Ding ran a close contest against Marco Fu as he defeated his fellow finalist 10-9 to win his third ranking event of the season (consecutively, might I add). Something that hadn’t been done since the days of Hendry. This final saw Ding make five centuries, which would be added to his already impressive tally that season. Side note: Ding made the most centuries of his career this season with 62. The former century/season record was held by Trump with 61 in the previous season. If Robertson didn’t perform the way he did in 2013/14 (click here to read that Instant Classic), then Ding would have been the record holder for at least a little while.

Unfortunately, Ding wasn’t able to keep the streak going as he exited the UK Championship at the fourth round. If he didn’t win anything for the rest of the season, you could still comfortably say that Ding had a terrific campaign. However, he did win a further two ranking events: the German Masters in February and the China Open in April, with victories over Trump and Robertson, respectively.

Obviously many can say what they want regarding the number of events that modern players have to deal with, but the fact is Ding achieved something that hadn’t been done since Hendry in the early 1990s. In fact, he was at a chance of even overtaking this record by reaching the final of the Welsh Open that season as well, but his opponent was O’Sullivan, and I’m sure many know of O’Sullivan’s form in the 2014 Welsh Open.

With this season’s performance, Ding propelled his ranking tally into the double digits, from 6 to 11, overtaking the likes of John Parrott, Peter Ebdon and Jimmy White. Not only that, but also Robertson, Trump and Selby that year where only the Class of ’92 as well as Hendry and Davis stood ahead of him. Ding also saw his ranking improve from 10th to 2nd with his stellar performance, only held off by dominant Selby in the middle of his 7 year run at the top of the rankings.

Given Ding’s consistency in the years that followed, there’s nothing that can be taken away from this monumental achievement. Yes, a few others have reached this mountain since however, Ding did this when only one other person had before him, which was over twenty years beforehand. Not to mention, this was achieved during a time where the Class of ’92 flourished, along with the rising stars mentioned above.

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Looking Back At Snooker History: World Championship Challenge Matches (1964-68)

The World Snooker Championship, and snooker tournaments in general, all follow a similar format. This format generally adheres to a bracketed structure in which players are expected to win a series of matches as they progress through an event, thereby eliminating the opponents they defeat from the competition. This can be otherwise known as a ‘knockout’ format. However, the World Championship wasn’t always this way, as we’ll now explore.

In fairness, for the most part since the WSC’s conception, the tournament has involved the knockout format. Although, between the years 1964-68, it followed a different structure. Due to struggling interest in the sport between the years 1958-63, there were no WSC’s held. In fact, very few (if any) official tournaments were actually held during these years. Cuetracker shows that no tournaments were sanctioned from 1959-63.

That is until Rex Williams intervened. Williams was able to schmooze the BA&CC chairman and convince him over lunch to revive the WSC. One can only speculate as to the choice of format used for these events but the following events would be held under a challenge basis; whereby the defending champion would play against a challenger. And this would be the only match of the championship.

This may have been chosen due to the declining interest, so by playing fewer matches which all involved the defending champion would perhaps spark and retain a little more interest in the sport. Whether this was a successful method or not, one thing is for certain: who knows how long it would have been before the WSC returned, if at all.

Now that the World Championship had returned, enter John Pulman. Pulman was the winner of the previously held WSC in 1957, which made him the defending champion for the challenge-based WSC to follow. This is where Pulman established his dominance as he was able to successfully defend the championship in all of his encounters from 1964-68. This involved multiple victories over Fred Davis, Williams (as above) and later on, Eddie Charlton in the final iteration of the challenge-based WSC.

The interesting thing that struck me with these tournaments is that they weren’t held annually. Kind of. Again, the reasons are unknown but I feel the WSC’s/challenge matches were only held when it was available to do so. This meant that there were two WSC’s in 1964, three in 1965 and none at all in 1967. This technically meant that Pulman won two world championships in 1964 and three in 1965. However, there are always going to be asterisks next to these stating how these were contested over challenge matches. Although, when Pulman won every single match, was it really a challenge?

Other fun facts about these series of challenge matches were that a couple of them were held in South Africa as part of a tour. Also, Williams was able to break the previous WSC record break of 136 as he made a 142 against Pulman in November 1965. This record stood for 16 years until it was finally beaten by Doug Mountjoy in 1981.

Nevertheless, the WSC format did eventually revert back to its original knockout format in 1969. This, of course, was the time many considered the start of the modern era as it then propelled snooker into stardom thanks to the likes of Pot Black and personalities of those such as Ray Reardon and Alex Higgins. It’s hard to tell whether this would have still occurred without the existence of the 1964-68 challenge matches, but they certainly have their place in snooker history and I’m glad that Williams’ intervention aided in reducing the gap between WSC’s during a difficult time period.

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Memorable Hits - Murphy's Magical Manoeuvre

The Shaun Murphy trick shot from the 2017 World Championship will go down as one of the most memorable hits for years to come. Whether it was because of the Crucible setting, his opponent, the stunned reaction of the crowd/commentary box or the smooth walk-away, this exquisite pool-like shot brought another level of excitement to the WSC that year.

It was the second round of the WSC as Murphy found himself 3-1 down against veteran, Ronnie O’Sullivan. O’Sullivan had just played an impressive long, two-ball plant with the cue ball coming back up the table next to the yellow. However, O’Sullivan didn’t play the ‘nestle behind a colour’ snooker too well to leave Murphy fully snookered. Although, it was awkward enough to block the view of the main bunch, leaving a line of sight only on the red at the left centre pocket (which couldn’t be cut in).

Murphy quickly established that the red couldn’t be cut it so the only other option would be to go up and down the table. Much like Steve Davis said in commentary, this was a relatively safe shot to play given that if Murphy missed, he wouldn’t be leaving the red on unless he massively under-hit the shot. The problem with the up and down though, is that the yellow was blocking the cue ball slightly enough so that the bottom/black cushion couldn’t be hit naturally.

So in the minute and a half that Murphy spent thinking on this shot, he was visualising exactly how the cue ball would react coming off the cushions while the rest of us were trying to think about a possible escape route. Once it was clear in his mind what kind of shot he wanted to attempt, it was now a matter of practice.

With an extreme amount of right hand side – which can be classed as check side, in this case due to the resultant impact – Murphy struck so the cue ball impacted the left side cushion first. Now, while it may not look like that had an angular effect when it bounced off the side cushion, it already slowed the pace of the cue ball down a little bit, hence the check side. But the bottom cushion is where the spin really took effect. When the cue ball came off the bottom cushion, the right hand side in effect pulled itself back up the table towards the left hand side where it was able to impressively nudge the red in the left centre.

If there was no side applied the cue ball would have follow the natural angle and likely ended up around or just above the blue. However, the shot was played with right hand side; so much in fact, that the cue ball bounced off the left side cushion on its way back up. Murphy may or may not have accounted for this extra bounce since had it not occurred, chances are the cue ball would have followed a straight line back up to knock the red in regardless.

The fact that Murphy succeeded in his method on his first attempt in a manner that no one was really expecting meant that he received a loud response from the audience and commentators alike. John Virgo and Davis particularly, were racking their brains trying to figure out what Murphy was thinking, as well as trying to find a path out themselves. My favourite moment during commentary was when Davis just flat out went ‘now, what’s he doing?’ Please always do commentary, Steve.

But were there alternative shots? The shots that Virgo and Davis were talking about where Murphy could have played safe off the red would have certainly sent the red up the table due to how close it was to the bottom jaw of the centre pocket. The only other possible option would have been a two-cushion escape with running (left) side off the reds near the pink. Though this would have been just as technically difficult as the shot he played. In fact, it could have been more risky because if it was hit too thick, he would have left O’Sullivan the furthest right red on the table.

So it was actually a choice shot in terms of risk and reward. When Murphy cleverly thought of it, he potentially had the mind-set of giving it one or two attempts then trying one of the alternative shots, depending on how close he got. But the fact that he nailed it first time to everyone’s surprise, with a shot that goes against the natural angles, while at the Crucible against O’Sullivan…well, it just deserved Shot of the Championship that year.

If he missed his attempt and then got it on the second or third, expectations would have been slightly dampened as the audience knew what he was going for. But it wasn’t, and that’s what made it special. And to those who criticise the shot for how easy it was are probably the same people who spend multiple attempts at their club trying to recreate the shot on camera, let alone in the circumstances that Murphy achieved it in.

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Snooker Events in Australia?

There was a time where snooker tournaments would reach a variety of different countries such as Dubai, Thailand and Australia; the latter of which has actually been fortunate on a couple of occasions to host the World Championship. Although, Australia hasn’t been home to a ranking event (or otherwise) since 2015. Considering the history associated with snooker and Australia, how has this come to be the case?

The event that we are all most likely familiar with is the Australian Goldfields Open (AGO), which was last held in Bendigo, Australia in 2015. Following that season, the event fell off the calendar, for reasons unknown. But we can at least hazard a few guesses. Bearing in mind the global presence of Australia, it would seem odd to not include a snooker event in this region; a region once acknowledged by Barry Hearn as an important part of snooker’s global expansion.

One factor we can look at is the travel time associated with an Australian hosted event. A quick online search will tell you that a flight to Australia (from the UK) will take on average 22+ hrs. Given how tightly packed the calendars are, this doesn’t leave much time for players to get used to the new time zone and other conditions, leading to certain players potentially being quite impacted by the resultant jet lag.

This could act as a deterrent for many top players choosing not to compete however, if you observe the draws for the final few AGO tournaments, you can see that the brackets are still filled with numerous top seeds. Even though players seemed to be okay with competing at this distance, World Snooker may have taken the decision that an extra 7-8 hours from China to Australia would be too much for players to bear.

Another factor is likely the viewership. Perhaps the viewing figures/ticket sales weren’t as high as WST executives were hoping for. They gave the tournament a chance for a few years but it might not have reached what they were expecting; no longer making the tournament viable for them. The location choice may have impacted this result – Bendigo is a city in Victoria, approximately 150 km north of Melbourne which many, at the time, considered as a weak choice of location with poor advertising for the sport.

This leads to the most likely reason – profitability. Whatever the reason, snooker just isn’t as popular a sport in Australia as it is in say, China. The AGO was kicked off the calendar during a time where an increased tournament presence was emerging in China, with the additions of the World Open, China Championship and so on. In a tightly packed calendar where events are taking place almost every week, WST need to organise and select events that they feel will make them the most money, and China is a priority region for them for this purpose.

But does that mean that Australia shouldn’t have an event on the calendar? I don’t think so. There isn’t a growing amateur scene in the Oceanic region, with increased relations with the WPBSA/WSF. If the WST can secure a space in the calendar (which includes a brief buffer period to allow for travel), increase the prize fund and choose an optimal location, then this can certainly achieve their goals while providing Australia an event to look forward to. I’m certain WST has the connections to accomplish this and we can one day hope to see the return of the Australian Masters.

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