Mark Williams - Choker ?

Now i'm not for a moment calling Mark a bad player or disputing his incredible career to date of which 99% of players to pick up a cue would die to have achieved ...

... but the facts right now are starting to build up and go against him, Mark Williams is turning into a bit of a mental dweeb:

2010 World Open - 2-0 up in the semis, only once had a player lost from that position in the tournament up to then, and Robertson goes on to beat him 3-2.
2010 UK Championship - 9-5 up in the final as Williams searched for his first major title since 2003, only to miss a glorious opportunity to kill off the match at 9-7.
2011 Australian Open - 8-5 up in the final and again had chances but succumbed to a player (Bingham) playing in his first ranking final.
2011 Shanghai Masters - 9-7 up and having all the momentum after winning 4 frames on the trot against a misfiring Selby whom himself hadn't won a ranking title since 2008, but Williams again let it slip.

In the above four examples which all occured in the last 12 months, Williams blew a total of 15 match points ... obviously not all were his fault, there were some big dollar plays from his opponents in that time, but there's enough of a pattern here to suggest Williams' confidence may be shot and, despite his rapid rise back to the top of the rankings this year, he may just have hit the wall.

The evidence is clear for all to see

To be fair Tubbs if he hadn't have stumbled in the UK final then he may not have had Higgins so much in his head for the Worlds semi and he could have added a third World crown to his collection, such fine margins

Bourne wrote:To be fair Tubbs if he hadn't have stumbled in the UK final then he may not have had Higgins so much in his head for the Worlds semi and he could have added a third World crown to his collection, such fine margins

He was dreadfully unlucky against Higgins in the UK final, that was no choke. The World semi-final was. I didn't watch the Australian Open final at all, I did watch today and, yes, he let it slip.

I just think it's disrespectful to call someone who has achieved so much a choker. I'm not criticising you Bourne, or anyone for that matter, because it's all about opinion, and my opinion is that Williams is going to prove that he is still a great player and a winner.

Tubberlad wrote:

Bourne wrote:To be fair Tubbs if he hadn't have stumbled in the UK final then he may not have had Higgins so much in his head for the Worlds semi and he could have added a third World crown to his collection, such fine margins

He was dreadfully unlucky against Higgins in the UK final, that was no choke. The World semi-final was. I didn't watch the Australian Open final at all, I did watch today and, yes, he let it slip.

I just think it's disrespectful to call someone who has achieved so much a choker. I'm not criticising you Bourne, or anyone for that matter, because it's all about opinion, and my opinion is that Williams is going to prove that he is still a great player and a winner.

Read the whole thread I'm not disrespecting him, i'm just calling it how I see it

Williams, like most players getting older, has accumulated a lot of battle scars and this probably affects his confidence when he find himself in similar situations to the ones that hurt him. It's just being human.
I don't think many players, if any, deserve to be branded "chokers", and certainly not the ones who have proved through their career how good they could be under pressure.

Bourne wrote:

Tubberlad wrote:

Bourne wrote:To be fair Tubbs if he hadn't have stumbled in the UK final then he may not have had Higgins so much in his head for the Worlds semi and he could have added a third World crown to his collection, such fine margins

He was dreadfully unlucky against Higgins in the UK final, that was no choke. The World semi-final was. I didn't watch the Australian Open final at all, I did watch today and, yes, he let it slip.

I just think it's disrespectful to call someone who has achieved so much a choker. I'm not criticising you Bourne, or anyone for that matter, because it's all about opinion, and my opinion is that Williams is going to prove that he is still a great player and a winner.

Read the whole thread I'm not disrespecting him, i'm just calling it how I see it

I said I wasn't criticising YOU haha... that was a very fair piece actually, and it's only fair that this is brought up.

And to be fair he did win a ranker in the last 12 months in a tight, tense finish so it hasn't been all doom and gloom ... but he could have been on another pedestal had he taken just 2 or 3 of these quoted chances.

Bourne wrote:And to be fair he did win a ranker in the last 12 months in a tight, tense finish so it hasn't been all doom and gloom ... but he could have been on another pedestal had he taken just 2 or 3 of these quoted chances.

He is a fantastic performer in overseas events, far more so than Williams and Higgins. Some big players don't perform at all overseas, but Williams is the very best in this regard.

I think he has a lot to give yet, and silverware will come his way. Selby was derided as a one-hit-wonder as far as titles were concerned, that's all changed now.

I knew a choker thread would be opened today. The only question was which Mark would be in the thread title.

I personally don't think he bottled the Bingham match. Bingham had a huge slice of luck at 5-8 when he fluked a snooker from a hit and hope and then on he barely missed until it was too late in the final frame. Williams did not get much of a chance in that match.

However today I think he definitely choked a few shots towards the end but it wasn't as if he was playing that well that they were 100% certainties.

Well lets just call spade a spade if these two are choker either one of them the standard of player below them Higgins aside must be diabolically poor to say the least...

I wouldnt say that it is a choker, because its clear that he can indeed finish matches off, and clinically e.g. World Championships this year. In addition he managed to regain his balance yesterday and beat Robertson to reach the final - in essence ue

However in finals, it's a trait that he's got to get under control, the longer the run of losing from seemingly impregneble leads is going to give people more confidence and play on his mind, especially if he goes 9-5 9-6 up in other finals.

PLtheRef wrote:I wouldnt say that it is a choker, because its clear that he can indeed finish matches off, and clinically e.g. World Championships this year. In addition he managed to regain his balance yesterday and beat Robertson to reach the final - in essence ue

However in finals, it's a trait that he's got to get under control, the longer the run of losing from seemingly impregneble leads is going to give people more confidence and play on his mind, especially if he goes 9-5 9-6 up in other finals.

he will not focus on today because he dont blame his bottle he blames a fellow williams he did not bottle in australia because bingham was superb he knows that...all he has to do is continue reaching finals he will win again.

Wild wrote:Well lets just call spade a spade if these two are choker either one of them the standard of player below them Higgins aside must be diabolically poor to say the least...

it pains me to admit it but Higgins is the only non-bottler on tour

Witz78 wrote:

Wild wrote:Well lets just call spade a spade if these two are choker either one of them the standard of player below them Higgins aside must be diabolically poor to say the least...

it pains me to admit it but Higgins is the only non-bottler on tour

Maybe also Trump.

Snooker Overdrive wrote:

Witz78 wrote:

Wild wrote:Well lets just call spade a spade if these two are choker either one of them the standard of player below them Higgins aside must be diabolically poor to say the least...

it pains me to admit it but Higgins is the only non-bottler on tour

Maybe also Trump.

some might say he bottled the WC from 12-9 and should have been 13-9 up.

Snooker Overdrive wrote:

Witz78 wrote:

Wild wrote:Well lets just call spade a spade if these two are choker either one of them the standard of player below them Higgins aside must be diabolically poor to say the least...

it pains me to admit it but Higgins is the only non-bottler on tour

Maybe also Trump.

trump bottled a hot date in brazil

Witz78 wrote:

Snooker Overdrive wrote:

Witz78 wrote:

Wild wrote:Well lets just call spade a spade if these two are choker either one of them the standard of player below them Higgins aside must be diabolically poor to say the least...

it pains me to admit it but Higgins is the only non-bottler on tour

Maybe also Trump.

some might say he bottled the WC from 12-9 and should have been 13-9 up.

not sure it was bottling but christ the more pressure higgins put on him the harder he was hitting thoes balls and if you just a millimeter off target at that pace you miss.

Witz78 wrote:

Snooker Overdrive wrote:

Witz78 wrote:

Wild wrote:Well lets just call spade a spade if these two are choker either one of them the standard of player below them Higgins aside must be diabolically poor to say the least...

it pains me to admit it but Higgins is the only non-bottler on tour

Maybe also Trump.

some might say he bottled the WC from 12-9 and should have been 13-9 up.

He took on a way too risky shot (for his standards a risky shot) and missed. Once you open the door for Higgins there's nothing in this world stopping him. Nothing to do with bottle. Just remember he potted an amazing frame ball in the last frame of the match.

Higgins is certainly the strongest player mentally on tour, their is no question or doubt about that. But I just struggle to put someone who has been World Champion twice, UK Champion twice, Masters Champion twice and has eighteen ranking titles to his name down as a bottler. I think their is a false sense amongst fans that any match you lose a big lead is down to bottling... it isn't. Williams possibly bottled today, he bottled the world semi-final, but other than that, I still feel he is possibly the man to beat on tour at this very moment in time.

Tubberlad wrote: I think their is a false sense amongst fans that any match you lose a big lead is down to bottling... it isn't.

spot on ive been saying that for years.

you can miss the same pots in first frame or 19th frame for all sort of different reasons. never herd a first frame missed pot refered as a choke so why should a deciding frame miss pot be automaticly called a choke ?

WILLIAMS CHOKED TODAY

YES OR NO WILD?

Wild wrote:

Tubberlad wrote: I think their is a false sense amongst fans that any match you lose a big lead is down to bottling... it isn't.

spot on ive been saying that for years.

you can miss the same pots in first frame or 19th frame for all sort of different reasons. never herd a first frame missed pot refered as a choke so why should a deciding frame miss pot be automaticly called a choke ?

I'm trying to think of obvious chokes... Matthew Stevens in 2007 against Shaun Murphy was the most horrendous one I can remember. I hate to say it, but Paul Hunter went to pieces against Doherty in 2003 with a big lead. Jimmy White in 1992 and 1994?

Jimmy got a kick on that black in '94 v Hendry

Hendrys manager Doyle told me so thats good enough for me.

Davis choked v Taylor in '85 and also v Alex in the '83 UK Final

even if players dont miss shots when there whole expressions change almost into one of fear and they become quivering wrecks at the table, then its a clear sign theyve buckled under pressure and therefore are choking under pressure.

Whereas the likes of Hendry in his prime kept that steely robotic look and didnt flinch whatever the situation

What are your opinions on Williams actually Witz, you don't talk about him much? How highly do/did you rate him?

Handling pressure in snooker is a very complicated topic.

The common expressions:

If you miss pottable balls in crucial times of a match it is called a choke.
If you can't close out a match having good chances to do so than you bottle it.

These expressions don't give insight whether pressure is responsible for the misses. They just could be normal misses.

The point is that Williams lost in the last year about 4 matches being well in front and which he should have won. That is concerning from his point of view. But you also can't forget the matches he did close out well and that includes one ranking final after the shock defeat in the UK.

My conclusion: there's no clear evidence that Williams is no longer a good pressure player. Maybe he will get worse after this experience but we don't know. The UK defeat wasn't his fault, so was the Australian Open but today the pressure got him in the end just like in the worlds. But every player can lose two matches in one year due to pressure. Higgins also did every time he tried to defend his world title.

I don't like the term choker just like Wild, it just makes things a bit too simple. It's far more complicated.

Tubberlad wrote:What are your opinions on Williams actually Witz, you don't talk about him much? How highly do/did you rate him?

the fact i hardly talk about him says it all

hes not a typical Marmite character who i love or hate

in other words, hes not registered much of an impact on me which is worse than someone like Hendry or Higgins

he was the real deal from when he beat Hendry in that black ball finish to the '98 Masters until his 2nd world crown in 2003. I didnt warm to him during his glory years cos i found him boring and he was actually kinda touted as the new version of Hendry which didnt exactly thrill me, plus at the time i was a big Ronnie, Ebdon and Lee fan.

His slump was dramatic and down to his lazy attitude IMO and fair play he came back but the last few years in snookerbeen a real strange transitional period with no-one really having any consistency.

I dont dislike him but i rarely cheer him on unless hes playing the likes of Higgins, Hendry and Robbo

Snooker Overdrive wrote:Handling pressure in snooker is a very complicated topic.

The common expressions:

If you miss pottable balls in crucial times of a match it is called a choke.
If you can't close out a match having good chances to do so than you bottle it.

These expressions don't give insight whether pressure is responsible for the misses. They just could be normal misses.

The point is that Williams lost in the last year about 4 matches being well in front and which he should have won. That is concerning from his point of view. But you also can't forget the matches he did close out well and that includes one ranking final after the shock defeat in the UK.

My conclusion: there's no clear evidence that Williams is no longer a good pressure player. Maybe he will get worse after this experience but we don't know. The UK defeat wasn't his fault, so was the Australian Open but today the pressure got him in the end just like in the worlds. But every player can lose two matches in one year due to pressure. Higgins also did every time he tried to defend his world title.

I don't like the term choker just like Wild, it just makes things a bit too simple. It's far more complicated.

UK Final think it was frame 16 to win it 10-6 he was 29 ahead after potting pink with last red with 27 on table but stupidly failed to play position down table onto yellow, typical slackness that i knew would come back to haunt him as needless to say Higgins eventually got the snooker and you could almost sense there and then Williams starting to get that sinking feeling and Higgins getting a major boost