Post a reply

Re: Snooker in Portugal

Postby Roland

Black to yellow was bloody ridiculous! Is he the best player in Portugal João? He has a very quick backswing and follow through but unlike others who play like that he has a lot of cue power.

Congratulations on getting on Portugese television by the way! I couldn't understand a word of it but I know that's you. Have you had any groupies yet?

Re: Snooker in Portugal

Postby Wildey

thanx for sharing

im always interested to know how big or growing snooker is in other countries ?

how would you say snooker is coming along in Portugal ?

Re: Snooker in Portugal

Postby João_SnookerPlanet

Yes Sonny, Hugo's our best player. He started playing in Mozambique and South Africa when he was 19 and at 21 he was already a regular 100 break maker. He came to England at 22, in pursuit of a snooker career but unfortunately he had to stop playing due to personal and professional issues. He returned to Portugal last year and recently founded a company called BSA, British Snooker Academies, dedicated to snooker promotion. Their first academy is in Matosinhos, Porto. He's now starting to play again, after almost 9 years without touching a cue. It's really difficult for him to start everything over and over again, but he's improving quite quickly. In fact he has a very unsual cue action, with a very short backswing and follow trough (as you correctly spotted) but it seems to work for him. He uses a lot of wrist action and I think that's the secret of his cue power (I've seen him playing some crazy deep screws). He plays with a 54" rack cue by the way :)

It was a really good experience with the national tv and it's certainly helping to promote snooker and the academy. I haven't had any groupies yet, but some old women were very excited with it rofl
Hugo and Pedro Vaquinhas, a very experienced player who follows snooker since the early 80s, are coaching many young lads (myself included) and some of them are improving very nicely. I spent almost all the summer there but I live in Lisbon where there's only 1 snooker table, in a very expensive and selective club (It's about 10£/hour, or more!); so, I can only pratice about 2 times per week. However, Hugo's thinking about opening an academy in Lisbon, between December and February.

Snooker has been quite popular in Portugal in terms of tv audiences, but before Hugo came, the places to play and the competitions were almost inexistent. However, things are changing now and we face a very positive future. Hugo has been talking a lot with Neil Tomkins, from Global Snooker, and there a good possibility of organizing a nice exhibition in December and something bigger in 2011.