Just a rant.....
- The players attitudes
The constant moaning about travelling and expenditure is becoming one of the main features of the sport; first it was the "blackmail" and "rape" of being "forced" to play in PTC's, then it was the increasing China trips, and now we have the sports biggest attention seeker demanding appearance money. As far as I can see, the top players want it all their own way......tournaments in their own back yard, which of course they don't have to qualify for, and prize money guarantees as well as many "family" breaks between tournaments. Have I missed something? Is Ronnie O'Sullivan the only dad in the world who wants to spend time with his kids? And after yesterdays "give me more cash" expose, he can't hide behind the "family" excuse much longer anyway! Now we know the REAL reasons for all the last minute withdrawals. Complete hammer who will NEVER grow up.
Can't believe either that so many are missing Australia......Mark Williams complaints about the tax situation show just how dim witted he is: it's a retention tax that applies in Australia, which means he can claim it back(!) I really hope the other no-shows haven't based their decisions on Williams' brainless outbursts, especially Trump....it beggars belief why a player his age doesn't want to play. I sincerely hope there are no more withdrawals, but I'm guessing one or 2 of the qualifiers will pull out as well.
And as for travelling generally, the Robertsons and Dings have to do it, as the Thorburns and Charltons did before that, and we NEVER hear them moan! Get a grip FFS!
- The secrecy surrounding the game
A week before the Australian qualifiers, and we still don't know who the 3 "TBD" players are. They'll come from the Q School ranking list, which has STILL not been published! The uncertainty over which ranking events will drop out of the cycle at the August cut off (all it says is that the "equivalent" event will drop off on the WS website......but how do you equate 6 UKPTC's from 2 seasons ago, to 4 this season? An October World Open 2 seasons ago, to a March one this season?)
Also, the regular "updates" to clarify an earlier misleading WSA announcement says it all! None of the buckers can communicate properly!
Also.....a new paralell ranking system starts this week, and there's not been a single detail about how it works! Will seeded losers keep their cash as ranking points? If so, that makes it a more restrictive system than the current one FFS!
- The qualifying system
New season, same old "staircase" qualifying events. All the new pros get lumped together in the first round, meaning half go out to each other and the rest are carefully picked off by journeymen. Just look at some of the last 48 matches today: King v Harold; Davis v McLeod; Day v Milkins and my personal favourite: O'Brien v Greene(!) Surely Hearn must look at line ups like this and shake his head in disbelief? It sickens me that it's the same bunch of has-beens or never-gonna-be's that consistently get through to tournaments.....no wonder the sport is perceived to be "boring".
And before the "if they can't beat the journeymen, then they're not good enough" brigade dive in here, ask yourselves how many of the journeymen would get to the last 32 if they all got drawn against each other in the last 128, or had to face a top seed without the cushion of guaranteed prize money? bucking winds me up no end, this.
And before the final qualifying round of the Wuxi is underway, not one single Chinese player remains. Yet some UK players have rolled along to Sheffield, played 1 match, and picked up £1500 minimum prize money WITHOUT SETTING FOOT IN BLOODY CHINA! I cannot be the only one who gets wound up by this??!!?? Snooker must be the bucking laughing stock of sports when it plays it's qualifiers for Chinese and Australian events over here(!) No wonder the Chinese organisers demand wildcards with this ridiculous system in place, but I'd rather the wildcards were given to all the Chinese pros rather than the usual line up of ex-pros or schoolboy talents.
I think a good solution to a lot of the games problems would be to throw the doors open to any player with a highest break of 1. Let anyone turn pro. Play all the tournaments on the PTC model and let everyone earn cash and points. Seed the top 100 into the draw, let the organisers nominate wildcards, then throw the rest in a qualifying event......held in the same country btw......the players who want to play can travel, and those who don't, won't. Dead simple.
I can't help thinking that the allocation of tour places to Canada, Egypt and Australia stinks of tokenism, when they clearly aren't good enough to play on a tour restricted to 99 players. They'll all be non existent by January is my guess. If you're gonna cap the tour, it should be the BEST 99.
If I think of more, I'll add it later. Sorry about the length, and don't feel the need to reply. Just had to unburden myself lol.
- JIMO96
- Posts: 251
- Joined: 22 December 2011
- Location: Scotland
- Snooker Idol: Liang Wen Bo
- Highest Break: 96