Congratulations to Chinese number one Ding Junhui who yesterday defeated Stephen Hendry 13-6 in their East v West Challenge match held in Beijing…
I did not manage to catch any of the action myself but from what I can tell it seems that Hendry was well below par, giving Ding several chances to score heavily and open up a 10-2 lead at the end of day one. Though Stephen was able to come back at him slightly on Sunday to make the scoreline 12-6, the damage had already been done and Ding completed victory in the next frame.
More information including a match report, video interviews and a blog from Stephen Hendry can be found over at 110sport.com here.
I am not sure how successful the event was over in China and how many spectators were there to watch the event but I would imagine that any exposure such as this has to be a positive move in a market that is already hungry for more top level snooker.
The only black mark against the event appears to have been the quality of the free live stream of the event as provided by 110sport which judging by the comments posted by fans on sites such as The Snooker Forum, was problematic to say the least. Certainly the ‘instant updates’ as promised by the SnookerWinner Twitter feed did not materialise.
Hopefully lessons will have been learned for the future and that the coverage of future events of a similar nature will be better received.