by lhpirnie » 20 May 2022 Read
The draw was very well organised, although the video crashed for a few minutes in the middle of the Event 1 draw, so a couple of matches need to be confirmed.
However, the standard of the players isn't great. From my judgement, the best players present are: Luo Honghao, Rory Thor, Thanawat Tirapongpaiboon, Hamza Akbar, Kritsanut Lertsattayathorn, Dechawat Poomjaeng, Amir Sarkhosh, Muhammad Asif, Moh Keen Hoo, Wiphu Phuthidabodi. Some of them have played professional snooker before, but not for a few years. Realistically, only Luo Honghao is good enough to make any impact.
I'm disappointed not to see Kei Kamihashi, Aung Phoo, Passakorn Suwannawat, Boonyarit Kaettikun or any mainland Chinese players apart from Luo Honghao. Most of the players are from Thailand, Pakistan, Malaysia or Iran. There are 4 Mongolians, 2 from Philippines and 1 from Nepal.
Apart from Luo Honghao, none of these players are anywhere near as good as Sunny Akani, Gao Yang, Zhao Jianbo, Bai Langning, Cheung Ka Wai, Andy Lee, Liu Hongyu, Wang Yuchen, Deng Haohui, Zhang Zhijie, Nattanapong Chaikul who have all been competing in the UK Q School. Something has gone very badly wrong with the planning of this.