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EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Roland

The EPTC event which was due to take place at the same time as the Power Snooker event at the O2 Arena, London, has been relocated to the South West Snooker Academy in Gloucester.

See photos of the venue in this topic:

viewtopic.php?f=134&t=1271


I will let Janie or Sarah from the academy fill us all in with details :santa:

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Sarah Mount

Details are currently being discussed and finalised as we were only approached yesterday to hold the event at the Academy. What I can say though is we WILL definitely be selling tickets for spectators and we WILL definitely be streaming as many of the tables as possible. We realise that the decision to change the venue will have disappointed some, especially those planning to visit the Offenburg event, but from what we gather it was a case of changing the venue or not being able to go ahead with the event at all. Hopefully, once the disappointment eases, people will be pleased to know the event will at least be taking place.

From our point of view at the South West Snooker Academy, it is a great honour to be holding a PTC/EPTC event and we are going to do everything we possibly can to make the event as enjoyable as possible for both the players and the fans. By streaming matches online we hope to enable everyone the opportunity to watch as much of the tournament as possible both in the UK and outside the UK. We do however realise that this is no compensation to those fans who had purchased tickets for Offenburg.

As soon as we have more details, which should be over the coming days, I will be sure to post them here for anyone who may be interested.

Regards

Sarah

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby randam05

Well thats pretty cool, good crowd in there, but only one table at a time, or will there be backstage tables going on?

Surely they can get some streaming of this!

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Witz78

randam05 wrote:Well thats pretty cool, good crowd in there, but only one table at a time, or will there be backstage tables going on?

Surely they can get some streaming of this!


they have lots of tables in the SW Academy (8/10/12 im not 100% sure) with very small capacities in a club style set up then there is one show table with an arena that holds 4 or 500 people. I presume this will be the TV table and the best matches will be stuck on this table.

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Sarah Mount

Hi randam05,

As well as the arena we have 12 other star tables in the Academy which we will be using for the event with as many of them as possible being streamed online to hopefully give a choice of matches.

Here are a few pics of our other areas in the Academy:

Practice Room
Image

Match tables 2-4
Image

There will indeed be streaming!

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Roland

Great news about the multi streaming and the spectators Sarah. I know of at least one Bristolian who doesn't care for Power Snooker so maybe he can be pursuaded to go along and take some blurry pictures of himself with some players to put on the forum. :redneck:

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby randam05

Cheers sarah.

WOOO STREAMING! links please when up and running.

and it looks like a very lush venue and academy.

Now I actually live in Devon so its not to far away from me the academy, well as far as snooker goes in the south west its very close, other than that its london for the masters. I am very into snooker and play a lot, so in a year or two would be very interested in coming to the academy a lot. Any information sent through a PM or something sarah would be great, info such as amateur tournaments or nationals, how to enter or anything like that really, if thats the sort of thing that goes on there, I dont really know at all, just guessing. I would love some oppertunities to play matches as there is a local league around here and nothing else, the only north devon snooker club closed down years ago so, me, being a huge snooker fan am very dissapointed with snooker in the south west.

Thanks for any info sarah.

randam05

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Roland

randam - that reads like a PM :redneck:

I'm sure if you write to her she can help you out.


I love those undertable lights - they give a really nice vibe to the place. Some mellow pictures on the walls and it'd be perfick.

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Wildey

Due to poor ticket sales, as a result of top players competing in the Power Snooker event on the same week,


absolute bullocks <doh>

its changed because of power snooker but not because of that <doh>

sorry but this is a very poor decision for the sport and its done to accommodate players rather for the right thing.

we need to play EPTC in Europe that's the whole point of them ok technically Gloucester is in Europe lol

but us Brits gets enough live snooker to go and see if we want.

this is by no means a criticism of the academy in Gloucester because ive advocated the use for it for weeks and from a selfish me me me point of view im chuffed its there however for the sport i think its a kick in the teeth for people in europe and people of offenburg.

we need to be spreading this game far and wide if its to grow not come back to Britain at a whim because it suites players.

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Wildey

Sonny wrote:Gloucester or no event and you would choose no event

idea of Playing EPTC or PTC is there wont be top players in all event they are using that as a very poor excuse indeed.

in Brugge last week they had no idea how many would attent thats why they had to get more seats in.

THE ONLY REASON they changed it was to acomadate Power Snooker and NOT because tickets was down.

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Smart

Sonny wrote:Great news about the multi streaming and the spectators Sarah. I know of at least one Bristolian who doesn't care for Power Snooker so maybe he can be pursuaded to go along and take some blurry pictures of himself with some players to put on the forum. :redneck:


This thread cheered me up BIG STYLE. I am now a fan of the EPTC ................................ :D <cool> :ahh:

How fickle am I <laugh> rofl

Right then we just need details of dates/times, names playing, draw............. ticket prices :D <cool> :ahh:

:wave:

Sarah Mount <cool>

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Sarah Mount

@randam05

I will be sure to post links of the live streaming on this forum for anyone who wishes to watch any of the matches. In terms of info on the Academy, we opened in June this year with the Pink Ribbon tournament in which 128 players competed over four days with Michael Holt beating Jimmy White in the final. It was all in aid of Breast Cancer charities and it will be returning next June :D

We will be holding a number of amateur tournaments although as the schedule is so much busier this season we have struggled to find free weekends until after Xmas when we will launch our QSP Series (Q School Preparation Series) This series is for a maximum of 128 players and will give players the chance to compete for a place in the top four of our rankings, after four events, with the top four winning their £1000 entry fee into Q school. It costs £500 to enter the series but we will be giving away over £25,000 in prize money over the series (based on 128 entries) and it will be an opportunity for players to get match practice on tables which are fitted to the same specification as those in the World Snooker Academy (where the Q School occurs). We will also be giving scholarships for free use of the Academy's facilities to those who are in the top 8 to provide high quality practice facilities in the build up to the Q School. More information is available on our website

We will also be running Pro Am events at the Academy. We will post all info of up coming events on our website www.southwestsnookeracademy.com this will include details of how to enter events.

Paul Mount also offers coaching at the Academy.

Sorry for writing all this on this thread but I thought that instead of PMing randam05 I would post it here incase anyone else was interested. :)

@Sonny

Thanks Sonny-the under table lights do look really smart! We are currently working on making the walls a little less bare but with 20,000 sq/ft of space there sure are a lot of walls!! We will be having large framed pictures of all of the players we manage in the Academy as well as mementos of events we hold over the coming years.

@WildJONESEYE

I totally understand your disappointment and grievances and obviously we are coming in to this off the back of it being deemed not commercially viable to be held in Offenburg.

I understand that your comments are not a criticism of an event being at the SWSA but merely the fact that it is an EPTC event and I have long appreciated your support (as well as other posters) in voicing your opinion that the SWSA should be used for some World Snooker events. We are keen to make the best of the situation and ensure that this event will be totally accessible to anyone who wishes to attend or watch online.

@StalinESQ

I am glad that you are pleased to see an event in Gloucester. Will we be seeing you at some point over that weekend? I do hope so! I will be posting more details regarding spectator access by this evening (all being well) It's been a very busy week at the SWSA this week but we like busy ;)

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby randam05

Thanks very much sarah, great info and look forward to upcoming events. Is it actually possible for me to enter any of them? I know they are amateur tournaments, but i only play in a locak league, does that still class as amateur? I guess so.

Anyway thanks again.

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Wildey

@Sarah (thought id use the @ lol)

im just sceptical on the motive behind WS Decision that's all....they cant start to run small tournaments like these in europe and think of ticket sales then that's just not a option or they might as well not bother with them.

they got to use them as a bulldozer to take the game forward even if they lose money.

on my personal opinion on this its great news WS are taking a tournament to your academy it looks brilliant for a great weekend action <ok>

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby weewelshwitch

@Wild !!

re the ticket sales in the EPTCs - this is not to do with World Snooker but to do with the "partner promoter" They have to guarantee part of the prize fund in order to stage an event. If they can't get their money back via ticket sales, refreshments, merchandise etc then they're going to take an unsustainable loss.

I think there were three factors that affected Offenburg event.
1. The German national championships, all categories, are on at the same time, taking out most of the amateur players who would have entered and been spectators.
2. Offenburg is little over an hour away from Russelheim and consecutive weeks, so asking the same people to take time off and pay in too short a time span.
3. The Power snooker came in with no consultation to anyone at all and plonked their event across the dates, claiming many of the big names who therefore couldn't play in Offenburg.

We are thrilled to bits to be staging our first official World Snooker event in Gloucester, but we all agree we wish it hadn't been under these circumstances.

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Wildey

The Way Live Scoring is now scrap what i said i want every tournament thats not on TV Played at Gloucester that way im guaranteed Up Dates <ok>

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Smart

Sarah Mount wrote:
@StalinESQ

I am glad that you are pleased to see an event in Gloucester. Will we be seeing you at some point over that weekend? I do hope so! I will be posting more details regarding spectator access by this evening (all being well) It's been a very busy week at the SWSA this week but we like busy ;)


@Sarah :wave:

I'm impressed already with the pictures of the main arena, practice area and other match tables. Your venue looks cracking. Personally I have been to the world champs qualifiers in Sheffield the last 3 years and enjoyed it immensely - a real fantastic day out (despite the lengthy drive, early wake up call).

From a purely sefish point of view I would welcome more and more snooker (qualifiers and PTCs) being played in Gloucester. Are you viewing this impromptu opportunity as a chance to show what you guys are capable of....? I think if you can put on a decent EPTC then its a case of onwards and upwards. Best of luck to you guys.

I will indeed be in attendance at some point, but will have to check the draw and any other committments first of all. <ok>

Now if you could get the world qualifiers at Gloucester, I would be in attendance a great deal............... THIS HAS TO BE YOUR AIM (please) <cool>

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby SnookerFan

Sonny wrote:Gloucester or no event and you would choose no event


I hate this as an argument, it gets used over and over. For any complaint, or criticism that is made somebody goes; "So, you'd prefer no snooker to this?" Next time you complain that you can't watch HD snooker, we should all go; "Would you chose no snooker over SD snooker?" :no: Of course nobody on this site wants no snooker, or why would we have signed up? It doesn't mean we have to pretend everything is perfect.

On the plus side of this, at least there is some competition for what to view this weekend, so the very against Power Snooker can watch it some real snooker. Personally, I'm not one for live streaming personally, but then I aint one for this Power Snooker idea. But the choice to watch some real snooker over PS, and the fact they are selling tickets is an improvement. Hopefully they can build on this, and we can see more PTC on television now.

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Smart

EPTC4 will be played at the South West Snooker Academy in Gloucester.

With less than 128 entries, Euro Players Tour Championship event four will be played on 29-31 October, as the amateur pre-qualifying day will not be required.
The draw for this event will be performed on Monday 11 October, with the seeding based on the Order of Merit after the completion of PTC5. It is our aim to post the draw and format on the website the same day.

_____________________________________________________________

DRAW TOMORROW :idea: <cool> :idea: <cool>

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Sarah Mount

The deadline for entries has been extended so the draw won't be completed until the new deadline has passed which will be Friday 15th October. We are all working hard getting the exhibition ready for tomorrow night and then we will be announcing more news regarding EPTC4 at the end of this week!

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Wildey

i think that's only fair probably a lot of British amateurs couldnt have made the trip to ofenberg but could get to you

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Monique

and a lot of German, Belgian and Netherlanders amateurs probably can't make the trip to Gloucester, not to mention the fans who had bought tickets. I don't think this is fair by any means. The fans will probably get a refund of their tickets, but what about transportation and hotels?
The SWA is a wonderful venue and I would be all in favour for it to be used in PTC but not this way.

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby Wildey

Monique wrote:and a lot of German, Belgian and Netherlanders amateurs probably can't make the trip to Gloucester, not to mention the fans who had bought tickets. I don't think this is fair by any means. The fans will probably get a refund of their tickets, but what about transportation and hotels?
The SWA is a wonderful venue and I would be all in favour for it to be used in PTC but not this way.


as you know by reading this thread i did say that earlier it is a decision i was against and still against from the sport situation and the point of having EPTC but many British people are selfish and me me me thats why they backed this decision from the off.

im Delighted they have gone to SWA and they have streaming capacity there which is good from a fan point of view and a Fantastic Venue for snooker but i really feel they have sold the Europe people up the creek a bit.

Re: EPTC Offenburg to be played in Gloucester

Postby randam05

I really dont care that its not in germany, if theyre not going to stream live from there. Streaming or it being played in europe with no streaming? Im sure its been said earlier on here. OK its still a shame germany now dont have a tournament and fans will be let down.