I am back from Day One at the Crucible though with needing to be back on the road to Sheffield in eight hours time I will unfortunately not be able to upload my photographs so far. Still, click below for my report…
It may be my sixth year of visiting the Crucible for the World Snooker Championship but that Day One feeling of excitement was as strong as ever as I arrived at the venue for the Mark Allen v Tom Ford match.
Before the match started there were a few points of interest, notably the new carpet which reminiscent of the old Embassy days was red as opposed to the previous yellow, whilst the players also came out to walk-on music. I can’t say that I particularly liked or disliked the latter but the majority of the crowd seemed to enjoy it…not sure about what some of the traditionalists thought though, I might have to ask them!
As for the match it was always going to be interesting to see how Tom Ford would cope against Mark Allen and in frame one it looked like he had settled down well as he made a break of 59 before missing a red to the yellow pocket. Unfortunately for Tom, Mark himself was looking good and punished his error with a clearance of 66 before he added the next two frames to leave his opponent under early pressure.
Tom to his credit fought well in frame four to clear and force a re-rack but having lost the toss and played the opening shot he could only watch as Mark immediately doubled the black into a corner pocket and left the arena with a 4-0 mid-session lead.
Tom’s head shaking as he too left the arena said a lot I felt and this showed on the players resumption as he began to make more and more errors and found himself 7-0 down and looking like he might become only the second ever player to lose 10-0 at the Crucible. Happily however he did manage to take the next frame, with a century no less, before what proved to be the most dramatic frame of the day.
Yes it was only 1pm on Day One but we were about to witness this year’s first real chance of a 147 as Mark put together a brilliant break up to the last remaining red which was awkward on the side-cushion. Having already tried to move it once and failed narrowly, Mark this time decided to play behind it and did so successfully. Although he was able to pot it however, he was not nicely on the black and though that too did drop, he could only leave himself an extremely thin cut on the final yellow.
I thought that he might have to double the yellow but as it turned out he was able to pot it brilliantly, with the white careering round the table and hopefully onto the final green. Unfortunately though the black was to get in the way of this plan and Mark found himself snookered full ball on the green, throwing his chalk up into the lighting in frustration as the £147,000 bonus slipped away.
Despite this disappointment however, Mark had looked excellent and will need just two further frames tomorrow morning to book his place in the last 16. I have said it before having watched Allen at the Crucible but there is something about his demeanour at the table that I love, he seems to have a real presence, almost an aura about him and just seems like he absolutely belongs there on the big stage. That showed in his performance as although an 8-1 scoreline was probably harsh on Tom, he did play very well.
Tom though will be frustrated, but to his credit despite his obvious disappointment he kept smiling throughout what was a match played in very good spirit. There was a lot of banter between the two players, including an amusing moment when referee Leo Scullion walked into Mark’s glass and Tom quipped “Yeah you’ve got to watch that”. Hopefully he will be able to relax tomorrow and at least make the scoreline respectable.
With little time between the morning and afternoon session, I caught up with a few of the regulars before heading in for the first session of the Stephen Hendry/Zhang Anda match.
The first four frames were one-way traffic, Hendry keeping things tight and waiting for the errors to come from his inexperienced opponent who like many a debutant before him, appeared to have completely frozen. At 4-0 down things were looking bleak for the Chinese youngster but as in qualifying, he again demonstrated his terrific temperament and managed to finish up the session trailing by just one frame at 5-4 to Hendry.
While Zhang by the end of the session looked like a different player, Hendry was playing terribly and was visibly becoming frustrated out there, presumably because of his own form and perhaps the understandably methodical nature of his opponent. Hopefully from his point of view he will be able to re-focus overnight and start tomorrow’s final session as he began today. Could be interesting though…
The final match of the day that I watched was that between John Higgins and Barry Hawkins which surprisingly stood at 5-4 to Barry following the morning session. I had not seen that match as I was watching Allen/Ford but understand from speaking to others that John was looking anxious and had recorded just one break over 30!
Early tonight it looked like this would continue as Barry had an excellent chance to lead 6-4, but as he failed to take advantage he soon found himself of the receiving end of a charge from Higgins who powered through to take six of the seven frames played and ensure that he would not fall victim to what would have been a huge shock on day one.
Other than the matches, what were the other talking points from the day? Well the lack of a CueZone tent was very evident for the regulars though in truth I do not think that it was greatly missed. The makeshift effort in the Winter Gardens which will also host the TV studio this year was something of a token gesture I feel.
On the TV theme it was interesting to see that this year they are broadcasting the TV footage inside the arena, instead of the score on many of the TV screens present, as has long since been the case in the Premier League. Overall I think that this is a good move, though it can be frustrating as sometimes I found myself looking at the TV monitor before five minutes pass and I realise that I am still doing so despite the actual match being right in front of me. It is surprisingly easy to do in fact!
In other snippets, Leo Scullion made his Crucible debut today, refereeing the Ford/Allen match in place of the stranded Jan Verhaas who remains in Holland, while I can confirm that there are courtesy cars for the players this year, some rather swish BMWs.
It was also very strange to see Stephen Hendry playing in a plain black waistcoat for what must be the first time since 1998 here!
Anyway I had better get to bed. Hopefully will be able to post a more detailed report tomorrow and also upload some videos of the player walk-ons that I was able to record…