A night in Grimsby for the Premier League

Finally I have a chance to recount my night out at the Premier League snooker, this time in Grimsby where Stephen Hendry drew with Ronnie O’Sullivan, while Shaun Murphy swept aside Marco Fu with his most impressive performance for a long time…

There will also be a photo gallery coming up later this evening…

Running slightly late after work I drove over to Grimsby and got to the venue for around 6:40pm, well in advance of the 7:30pm start time and I took my seat on the front row. It was my third visit to Grimsby for the Premier League having also attended in 2006 and 2007 and strangely enough I have had the same seat allocated each year, though this time it was over at the opposite side, perfect for the players walk-ons.

MC John McDonald keeps the crowd entertained

As ever, Matchroom MC John McDonald entertained the crowd with his repertoire of jokes (mainly about the prospect of Grimsby town having a female manager!), before the show began and Stephen Hendry and Ronnie O’Sullivan entered the arena to play their eagerly anticipated group stage match. In their interviews both appeared to be relaxed, Stephen talking about how he still feels the nerves coming into these matches and Ronnie discussing at length how he just wants to feel comfortable at the table at the moment.

The match itself was a relatively tame affair between the two by their standards, though I must admit that I did enjoy it nevertheless. Although Stephen might not be at the top of his game these days, for me there is still no more mouthwatering a match-up in snooker than Hendry vs O’Sullivan and it was the first time that I had been present for such an occasion.

The first chance of the match went to O’Sullivan but a strange miss on the pink after just one red gave Hendry an easy starter and without playing at his best he soon found himself 2-0 ahead. At this point Ronnie appeared to be getting frustrated, notably with the time he had to wait to break off in frame three as referee Paul Collier forced him to wait until the end of the commercial break and you just wondered how he would react on the table.

An entertaining moment from the Hendry/ROS interview

Despite not being able to make the long pots however, he looked reasonably good in amongst the reds and got himself back into the match at 2-1, before eventually taking the last two to salvage a 3-3 draw. On balance I think it was a fair result and though he led 3-1, Stephen appeared to be quite happy with the result when considering who he was playing and how he himself looked on the long pots – I don’t think that he made one all match!

What followed was an entertaining interview between the two with SkySports presenter Andy Goldstein as Hendry rued a missed max and could not remember when his next match was (see video), while Ronnie noted how he loves to play Hendry in comparison with some of the other players who send him to sleep!

As an aside you can view a few videos from the evening over at my new PSB channel on YouTube here. Over time I will hopefully be able to add more videos that will be of interest to snooker fans out there.

Marco Fu chats to Andy Goldstein

Following this match there was a short break before the start of the second match of the evening between Shaun Murphy and Marco Fu. There was a strange atmosphere for this encounter as having had ‘the main event’ on first, this looked like it might almost be something of an anti-climax as a few people headed for the bar.

A must-win match for both players, Marco looked to be playing ok as he took the first frame but from there it was Shaun Murphy who stole the show with some brilliant snooker. Having turned things around to lead 2-1 he then came close to making the first 147 break under the shot clock, eventually breaking down on 105 as he struggled for position on the last red. Still he was 3-1 up and with further breaks of 134 and 62 clinched a crushing 5-1 victory to all but end Marco’s hopes of qualification.

Marco enters the arena

Following the match I managed to catch commentator and former world number six Mike Hallett who I had previously met last year at the EISS, before also bumping into Clive Everton on the way out and wishing both him and Dave Hendon well with Snooker Scene. 

Summary

Overall it was another enjoyable evening from the Premier League, not the very best on the table but the format of the event always works well and sees a sizeable crowd in attendance. The only change that I would have made in an ideal world would have been to have Hendry/O’Sullivan as the second match, indeed I was surprised to find that this was not the case. As was pointed out to me by Monique (from The Snooker Forum and the Ronnie O’Sullivan forums who I met last night) however, both Ronnie and Stephen have a long drive home from Grimsby and perhaps the players requested that they be on first.

Still, it was a good night nonetheless, particularly for me as a Hendry fan to see him in action against O’Sullivan for the first time and come out of it with a point. For anyone thinking of going along to the Premier League for a night I would certainly recommend it. Compared to the ranking events the players are far more relaxed and able to express themselves which undoubtedly helps the crowd to get involved.