No Random Draw for this Years UK Championship

Matt has posted on PSB that for this years UK Championship there is to be no draw for the first round ties with number 1 seed facing the World number 128 in the first round, number 2 seed facing the World Number 127 and so on down to 64 v 65


Matt says no reason's been offered for why this has been organised this way compared to the other tournaments and he offers a suggestion that this might be part of a compromise agreement with the BBC considering the tournament won't have all matches broadcast on TV.

Thoughts?

i agree with this seeding structure here and for other majors and the Worlds if the similar 128 in round 1 policy is eventually adopted too.

and in round 2 it will be 1/128 v 64/65 im presuming, 2/127 v 63/66......etc

Well with Flat 128 structure playing around with formats Round structure is limited so i guess this is the best way to make tournament different.

its a incentive i guess to not be seeded 128 if your playing the No 1 seed so higher up the Ranking you get a easier Match potentially awaiting you in these Tournaments.

yeh its a way of making the rankings important again

Witz78 wrote:yeh its a way of making the rankings important again

You're correct regards the format being 1 v 64; 2 v 63 and 3 v 62 etc for round two in theory)

The way to make the rankings important is to actually seed the top players through to venues and have the flatter structure for the pre-televised stages, and I say that as someone who has warmed to the 128 system in recent years.

The rankings matter for two tournaments at the moment, The Masters and The World Championships, that was the choice WS made and it seems that they're making it up as they go along at the moment. The rationale behind randomly drawing the seeds of 9-16, 17-32 and 33-64 was to avoid having repeated match ups which having this kind of system could reproduce.

I think this would be good for the PTC Finals like the PDC do in the darts with 1 v 32, 16 v 17, 9 v 24 and so on but I don't think it's a good idea for the UK's but a reseeded draw would be interesting, i.e the highest seed to win in round one meeting the lowest seed to win in round one in the last 64

No it was always on the cards from day 1 rightly or wrongly that the UK Would work out like this i remember Barry Hearn mentioning this when the idea of a Flat draw was first Mentioned.

How can you make it a flat draw if 16 players are seeded in to the last 32?

Wildey wrote:No it was always on the cards from day 1 rightly or wrongly that the UK Would work out like this i remember Barry Hearn mentioning this when the idea of a Flat draw was first Mentioned.

How can you make it a flat draw if 16 players are seeded in to the last 32?

Have the qualies flat would work. The whole reason why the UK dropped to 11 frames was to fit all the matches on TV

Not opposed to flat draw, opposed to fixed draws as Selby v 128; O'Sullivan v127 etc. Will be for this years UK.

Seed the 64 yes (I think seeding 16 or 32 in the 128 would be a good idea in future) but randomly draw the bottom 64 to play them

That 128 could change weekly regarding the Rankings so its not fixed.

who knows who the 128 player will be?

because i don't.

im not saying its right but Hearn always said it would be this way.

Personally id make the UK back to how it was and drop the flat structure to that so that players has a position to play for in December and the World in April and make every other Ranking tournament Flat structure.

that way you earn your position at the last 32 of those 2 tournament

Draw is out here.

Looks like it is seeded 1v128; 2v127.... then 1v64; 2v63......

No Steve Davis... looks like he is heading to the jungle instead!!!

but this way Amateurs like Shane Castle will be playing Mark Selby on BBC TV on the first TV Saturday

fridge46 wrote:Draw is out here.

Looks like it is seeded 1v128; 2v127.... then 1v64; 2v63......

No Steve Davis... looks like he is heading to the jungle instead!!!

Wildey wrote:but this way Amateurs like Shane Castle will be playing Mark Selby on BBC TV on the first TV Saturday

I wouldn't actually mind that too much.

It'd be a bit one-sided of course, but it might be good to see some new players to mix things up a bit.