With the final stages of the UK Championship starting tomorrow, here are some tournament statistics, kindly provided by Chris Turner from the Global Snooker Centre forums…
Here are Chris’ stats:
- This will be the 32nd running of the UK Championship, originally called the United Kingdom Professional Snooker Championship. Only the World Championship and the Masters have a longer history.
- It is being staged at the Telford International Centre for the second time. There have only been four other venues. The first championship, in 1977, was held at Blackpool Tower Circus. It then moved to Preston Guild Hall for 20 years and then to Bournemouth International Centre for three years before moving to the Barbican in York for the next six years.
- The oldest winner was Doug Mountjoy who won for the second time in 1988 at the age of 46 years and 172 days.
- The youngest was Ronnie O’Sullivan. He was just 17 years and 358 days when he won in 1993, the youngest winner of any ranking tournament.
- The lowest ranked player to win the title was Ding Junhui who was ranked 62 when he won in 2005. Ronnie O’Sullivan was 57th when he won in 1993.
- The most wins have come from Steve Davis with six. Stephen Hendry has five to his credit and Ronnie O’Sullivan has four. Doug Mountjoy, John Higgins and Mark Williams have each won it twice.
- Hendry has also lost in five finals. Steve Davis has lost in four, Alex Higgins and Ken Doherty in three each.
- Steve Davis makes his 30th consecutive appearance in the event and he has reached the last 32 in all but two of them.
- The biggest winner’s prize was the £110,000 collected by Stephen Hendry in 1990. This year’s first prize is £100,000 for the second year running.
- The only champions to have successfully defended the title are Steve Davis who did so four times and Stephen Hendry (3 times).
- There have been six maximums; four in the televised stages from Stephen Hendry (1995 & 1999), David Gray (2004) and Ronnie O’Sullivan (2007) plus three more in the qualifying rounds from Willie Thorne (1987) Peter Ebdon (1992) and Nick Dyson (2000).
- In 2004 Jamie Burnett made the only 148 break in tournament play in the qualifying stage at Prestatyn.
- Originally the event was only open to UK and Irish players but although overseas players have been included since 1984 none had ever claimed the title until Ding Junhui won in 2005.
- There have been nine different sponsors. Super Crystalate were the first in 1977. Then came Coral (1978-85), Tennents (1986-8), Stormseal (1989-90), Royal Liver Assurance (1992-95), Liverpool Victoria (1997-2000), Powerhouse (2002), Travis Perkins (2003-5)and Maplin Electronics (2006 to date)
- The Championship has been unsponsored on only three occasions.
- England has provided the winner 14 times, Scotland eight and Wales five.
- The most frames played in the final were 31. The finals of 1982 (Terry Griffiths beat Alex Higgins), 1983 (Alex Higgins beat Steve Davis) and 1990 (Stephen Hendry beat Steve Davis) all ended 16-15.
- Three other finals went to the deciding frame. John Virgo beat Terry Griffiths 14-13 in 1979; Stephen Hendry beat John Higgins 10-9 in 1996 and Mark Williams beat Ken Doherty 10-9 in 2002.
- The biggest margin of victory in a final was Steve Davis’ 16-3 defeat of Terry Griffiths in 1981.
- When Steve Davis met Ding Junhui in the 2005 final the difference between their ages was 29 years and 222 days – the biggest age gap between finalists in any ranking event.