Dafabet Scottish Open Final !!!

Good to see Mark Johnston Allen involved with the Stephen Hendry trophy

Johnny Bravo wrote:

Cloud Strife wrote:Despite Robertson seemingly being in decline, he's won 2 titles this season already and we are only halfway through.

Yea, but the 1st one is a Michey Mouse event and almost irrelevant.
And in this one he would have got beat by a top player.

Robbo has been scoring very well throughout the tournament, but he still has dubious shot selection at times and he's not the strongest mentally.

Yeah, I know all that.

I was being facetious about the 2 titles lol.

Holden Chinaski wrote:The word choke is overused on snooker forums. Snooker is a hard game with lots of pressure you know. Even Hendry, Ronnie and Higgins have "choked" lots of times.

Cao was very close to winning. That black almost dropped and Robbo had some luck in the end when he missed and never left anything easy.

This is Cao's first final. What do you expect?

I don't agree mate. That was a proper choke. From 8:4 on he looked like a completely different player. You could pretty much see it. And he had tons of chances. It wasn't as if Robertson played vintage Snooker to come back at him. Robertson himself looked twitchy. So no excuses even if it was your first final.

Holden Chinaski wrote:The word choke is overused on snooker forums. Snooker is a hard game with lots of pressure you know. Even Hendry, Ronnie and Higgins have "choked" lots of times.

Cao was very close to winning. That black almost dropped and Robbo had some luck in the end when he missed and never left anything easy.

This is Cao's first final. What do you expect?

Totally agree. we expect too much from players sometimes.

Hard to watch.
I hope that Cao can win one soon.

Wtf is going on?

Erza Scarlet wrote:Very painful to watch that at the end but I don't think Robertson is "there", any other top player could've taken him out imo, even a tired Ronnie and it needed some big chokes from Cao to do it. Obviously Neil can't say that but he was gracious enough to say Cao was indeed the better player and outplayed him. Surprisingly lol

His overall performance this event was pretty amazing tbqh. Similar really to ROS at the Welsh in 2016; truly amazing all the way to the final, only to scramble over the line in the end with a mediocre performance.

Winning is all that matters. Well done Neil.

kolompar wrote:

SnookerFan wrote:

kolompar wrote:Surely Cao won't win a ranking tournament? Can I put my life savings on Robbo?

You can if you want.

I could win a lot now, but damn, it's really looking like Cao will win.

Bottled it

The Chinese Andrew Higginson played unbelievable until 8-4 but even he knew he wasn't supposed to win.

Holden Chinaski wrote:The word choke is overused on snooker forums. Snooker is a hard game with lots of pressure you know. Even Hendry, Ronnie and Higgins have "choked" lots of times.

Cao was very close to winning. That black almost dropped and Robbo had some luck in the end when he missed and never left anything easy.

This is Cao's first final. What do you expect?

Look, it's a great achievement for him getting to the final. Nobody's saying otherwise. However, that doesn't mean he didn't choke in the final. The two things aren't mutually exclusive.

Deep down Cow himself will admit he choked heavily there. As noted though, it was his first final so he deserves some slack and understanding. Hopefully he'll learn from this experience.

I'm looking forward to seeing Robertson in the studio in January. Think he'll make a good pundit.

If Cao would have lost his semi against Trump people would say he's done a good job getting to the semi's and making his first maxi. Pretty good achievement. Now that he beat Trump and lost in the final, after playing a pretty good final, he's a choker, a bottler and his career is probably over. Snooker Island logic

Cloud Strife wrote:

Holden Chinaski wrote:The word choke is overused on snooker forums. Snooker is a hard game with lots of pressure you know. Even Hendry, Ronnie and Higgins have "choked" lots of times.

Cao was very close to winning. That black almost dropped and Robbo had some luck in the end when he missed and never left anything easy.

This is Cao's first final. What do you expect?

Look, it's a great achievement for him getting to the final. Nobody's saying otherwise. However, that doesn't mean he didn't choke in the final. The two things aren't mutually exclusive.

Deep down Cow himself will admit he choked heavily there. As noted though, it was his first final so he deserves some slack and understanding. Hopefully he'll learn from this experience.

Good post.

Holden Chinaski wrote:If Cao would have lost his semi against Trump people would say he's done a good job getting to the semi's and making his first maxi. Pretty good achievement. Now that he beat Trump and lost in the final, after playing a pretty good final, he's a choker, a bottler and his career is probably over. Snooker Island logic

Even if he'd lost 9-5 today people would be congratulating him on a great tournament.

Iranu wrote:

Holden Chinaski wrote:If Cao would have lost his semi against Trump people would say he's done a good job getting to the semi's and making his first maxi. Pretty good achievement. Now that he beat Trump and lost in the final, after playing a pretty good final, he's a choker, a bottler and his career is probably over. Snooker Island logic

Even if he'd lost 9-5 today people would be congratulating him on a great tournament.

Indeed.

TheRocket wrote:Definitely one of the biggest chokes in Snooker history. Not sure if you can say he can learn from this. We might never see him at the bigger stage again.

I agree.

Nobody disagrees it's a great achievement reaching the final of a ranking event, especially beating Trump the round before and coming 1 frame away from victory.

However, first final or not, that was a proper choke. Not as bad as Mike Hallet's one (that was the worst of them all), but very bad nonetheless.

Hopefully he can learn from this and cope better with the pressure in future big matches.

Iranu wrote:

Holden Chinaski wrote:If Cao would have lost his semi against Trump people would say he's done a good job getting to the semi's and making his first maxi. Pretty good achievement. Now that he beat Trump and lost in the final, after playing a pretty good final, he's a choker, a bottler and his career is probably over. Snooker Island logic

Even if he'd lost 9-5 today people would be congratulating him on a great tournament.

We are still congratulating him on a great tournament.

I honestly don't see what the problem is in calling a spade, a spade. Did he choke? Yes. Does that take away from the fantastic week he's had? No, it does not.

2 chinese players 1 frame away from winning their first ranker this season.

Bingtao and now Yupeng. Bingtao I think it's dead certain he's gonna have a great future. Yupeng? Only time will tell.

Cao has a fantastic tournament but he still choked at the end, and Neil won. It's what it is. He was very different from 8-5 and even worse when he was on that pink.

That's what pressure and lack of experience does in sport, said it by himself and Neil was talking about it in Eurosport interview too.

I think it's harsh to equate feeling pressure to choking.

If he was a top 16 player who'd won tournaments already and he'd done the same, then yes, call it a choke. But I think people are failing to take into account the huge amount of nerves and pressure he must have been feeling. You hear about players literally trembling when they're down on the shot because they're so nervous - is it really a surprise when they miss one?

It's also a bit insulting to Neil because he PUT pressure on Cao from the way he played from 8-4 down.

What a match!.


One has to feel sorry for Cao,he played crackin stuff but he did,nt half crumble in the last 5 frames,he totally collapsed,he choked,bottled it,blew it,the pressure,the new territory,the occasion cracked him.


Hard luck Cao,thats one heck of a bitter pill to swallow,but no one is immune to sickening defeats,every player experiences them,i,m sure he,ll go far in many tourneys in the future and that he,ll win some.


The black he so narrowly missed in the 16th frame was a toughie,especially under the circumstances,it was very missable,prior to that,he had 3 decent chances to pot the pink,but he choked on all three attempts.

In that frame alone he had about 5,6 chances to finish off Robbo.






Robbo,well what can one say,an amazing comeback,but yeah,a lucky laddie it has to be said,fair play to him in pullin it off though,but of course he needed a lot of help from Cao.



All the same,Well done to him though,it,s nuts the he ended up winning this,but as we all know,snooker is sometimes nuts,when it went 8-6,i really did think that Robbo could pull it off,so it,s no big surprise to me that he indeed did.



Congrats to the Aussie punk on winning The Scottish Open 2017!.






The win now puts him on 13 ranking titles.

Neil screwed up with the fist pump but he acknowledged that, and also was magnanimous in his winners speech. I said we would find out a lot about Cao, but it is the months ahead that will define him.

That was a very memorable final.
Good luck Cao.

A pity a bigger break is coming up now. I know we still have the german masters qualifiers but that hardly makes you exciting. At least the next tournament is a really big one and can't wait for that.

The Masters is always special.

The better player lost the match to be fair.

Confused on robbos current level because he potted some great pressure halls like the yellow and black in the decider but he missed some others that peak robbo wouldn't have.

Interesting times ahead

GJ wrote:The better player lost the match to be fair.

Confused on robbos current level because he potted some great pressure halls like the yellow and black in the decider but he missed some others that peak robbo wouldn't have.

Interesting times ahead

it wasn't a normal match for him. First ranking event final after a long time and his opponent played well for thirteen frames and then obviously crumbled.

I think in the end its more relief than anything for Robbo now and he can kick off from here.

I imagine John Higgins will be enjoying a very satisfying Christmas having 'stuffed' Ronnie. But at least Ronnie can enjoy some 'turkey' by reading his new 'novel'. Yuk yuk yuk

Badsnookerplayer wrote:Neil screwed up with the fist pump but he acknowledged that, and also was magnanimous in his winners speech. I said we would find out a lot about Cao, but it is the months ahead that will define him.

That was a very memorable final.
Good luck Cao.

Dame was very classy in his post-match interview

Badsnookerplayer wrote:I imagine John Higgins will be enjoying a very satisfying Christmas having 'stuffed' Ronnie. But at least Ronnie can enjoy some 'turkey' by reading his new 'novel'. Yuk yuk yuk

Ronnie can enjoy a nice Christmas because he's been by far the player of the season thus far, 3 rankers plus 2 Finals!

Andre147 wrote:

Badsnookerplayer wrote:I imagine John Higgins will be enjoying a very satisfying Christmas having 'stuffed' Ronnie. But at least Ronnie can enjoy some 'turkey' by reading his new 'novel'. Yuk yuk yuk

Ronnie can enjoy a nice Christmas because he's been by far the player of the season thus far, 3 rankers plus 2 Finals!

Oh no - sorry Andre. I was just joking and overstepped the mark there. No offence intended.

Mark and Neil will dominate from here on in now that they have tossed Ronnie a few bones.

Badsnookerplayer wrote:

Andre147 wrote:

Badsnookerplayer wrote:I imagine John Higgins will be enjoying a very satisfying Christmas having 'stuffed' Ronnie. But at least Ronnie can enjoy some 'turkey' by reading his new 'novel'. Yuk yuk yuk

Ronnie can enjoy a nice Christmas because he's been by far the player of the season thus far, 3 rankers plus 2 Finals!

Oh no - sorry Andre. I was just joking and overstepped the mark there. No offence intended.

Mark and Neil will dominate from here on in now that they have tossed Ronnie a few bones.

For a moment that seemed like something Hendry-fan would write No offence taken.

Cao went from playing like Dominic Dale in the 1997 Grand Prix final to playing like Andrew Higginson in the 2012 German Masters....