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Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Prop

There’s been a bit of discussion recently around Judd’s comments on the ranking situation, whether he’s right, whether he should be bothered about the rankings, and whether he’ll actually go on to fulfil his potential with Triple Crowns, and more specifically, multiple World titles.

What do you think?

For what it’s worth, this is my take. He needs more ‘nasty bastard’ in his game to win more big ones. I can’t put my finger on exactly what that quality is, and he’s definitely closer to being that player than he was a few seasons ago before he won the WC. But for me you can still see insecurity in him when he’s not playing in that unbeatable mode. It’s in his eyes.

Also I find his interviews seem less and less genuine. Like he’s not saying what he really thinks. Maybe he gets ‘help’ with those, a text from his brother or management or something. After the Bingham match for example, he said “Yeah he made it easy for me, I knew I had to play my best”. Which makes no sense. What he meant to say was ‘simple’. Not ‘easy’. Anyway that’s probably just bullocks on my part, and not exactly relevant to his game so much. Just an observation.

He’s definitely feeling it. He’s definitely insecure over what’s going to happen over the next few years, and that’s not helping him. And I’m not knocking him - I know I take the snake hiss as much as anyone but he is the best in the world and he is capable of winning multiple WCs - but he’s seemingly much more human than Hendry was during his reign or Selby is when he switches on dark-mode. He’s addressed the problems he had early on with having an average tactical/safety game, but he needs to add to that and create a genuine killer mindset. He doesn’t quite have that yet. And maybe it’s just not something you can learn. I don’t think Ronnie really had it, not as a notable quality like Hendry, Selby, Higgins, Davis. But Ronnie is almost the exception to every rule, and a comparison would be unfair.

Thoughts?

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Prop

Dan-cat wrote:I find him quite nasty when he trounces Ronnie, as he has a couple of times recently. A big meany baddy.


True. He doesn’t have a problem with the big boys - Ron, Selby, Higgins. Definitely holds his own amongst them. Maybe drops his guard when he feels he’s expected to beat a less legendary player. Or not as much drops his guard as pressures himself into trouble. He cares what people think of him, and what people expect of him.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Iranu

Prop wrote:
Dan-cat wrote:I find him quite nasty when he trounces Ronnie, as he has a couple of times recently. A big meany baddy.


True. He doesn’t have a problem with the big boys - Ron, Selby, Higgins. Definitely holds his own amongst them. Maybe drops his guard when he feels he’s expected to beat a less legendary player. Or not as much drops his guard as pressures himself into trouble. He cares what people think of him, and what people expect of him.

It’s not the players it’s the tournaments

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Running side

Spot on assessment Prop as usual, Judd has talent to spare but does seem to lose focus at times, like all the top players money not objective anymore, playing for titles and prestige may take a while to learn. Like to watch but wouldn't queue to get a ticket.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby James Bentley

Agree with everything Prop said in his opening post.

But I kind of agreed with something Judd himself said yesterday in his post-match interview. He pointed out that it's about winning tournaments, and he's definitely been best at that over the last three or so years. As he said, "I won five tournaments last year and I'm not no. 1?" Selby's only no. 1 at the moment because the World title's worth four or five "normal" events.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Juddernaut88

I feel Judd has got to try and win at least 3 ranking events in the 1st half of this season. Ideally UK championship, World Grand Prix and one of the home nation events. Winning the champions of champions would be ideal as he's not won that before. Then hopefully he can push on in the second half of the season.

It won't be easy by any neans but hopefully he can do it.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Dragonfly

Trump is clearly one of the most gifted players ever. And when he is in front in a match and things are going well as against Higgins in the World final, then he becomes close to unplayable.

However things don't always go well and that's where his problems are manifest. If his opposition plays well, and puts him under pressure then Trump becomes very vulnerable. He lost his 2 most important matches last season. Against Robertson in UK and Murphy in the Worlds. On both occasions a talented and dogged opponent stood up to Trump and he folded.

It's strange because he's not a bottler in the true sense. He has won triple crown. But for whatever reasons he does lose a lot of high importance matches. Hence his still relatively poor ( for his standard) record in the majors.

I know we have a bit of fun here with his Gibraltar open wins. But he does still appear very vulnerable in the biggest events. Perhaps he is under pressure with people saying he's got to win 4 world's or whatever. No doubt he will win another, but it gets harder older you get.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby csprince

trump has won 8 titles to selbys 5 in the current 2 year cycle.the worlds is overweighted we all know it. under the previous points system trump is 15475 points ahead.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby LDS

csprince wrote:trump has won 8 titles to selbys 5 in the current 2 year cycle.the worlds is overweighted we all know it. under the previous points system trump is 15475 points ahead.


No, I would argue the smaller titles are overweighted, the whole point of the Worlds is that it is a gigantic chunk of a player's prestige.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby csprince

LDS wrote:
csprince wrote:trump has won 8 titles to selbys 5 in the current 2 year cycle.the worlds is overweighted we all know it. under the previous points system trump is 15475 points ahead.


No, I would argue the smaller titles are overweighted, the whole point of the Worlds is that it is a gigantic chunk of a player's prestige.


the ranking system isn't fair full stop i hope we can agree on that.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby SnookerEd25

The rankings are a bit of a farce. Judd will likely go back top not because of what he does on the table in November, but because of a tournament two years ago.

:shrug:

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Iranu

LDS wrote:
csprince wrote:trump has won 8 titles to selbys 5 in the current 2 year cycle.the worlds is overweighted we all know it. under the previous points system trump is 15475 points ahead.


No, I would argue the smaller titles are overweighted, the whole point of the Worlds is that it is a gigantic chunk of a player's prestige.

I agree.

Ask any player if they’d rather have a career like Graeme Dott’s or Stephen Maguire’s and I guarantee they’d say Dott’s.

The biggest issue is the overweighting on winners, in my opinion, when compared with semi finalists etc

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Dan-cat

SnookerEd25 wrote:The rankings are a bit of a farce. Judd will likely go back top not because of what he does on the table in November, but because of a tournament two years ago.

:shrug:


Enjoy your few weeks at the top Selby <laugh>

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby TheRocket

I dont think intensity or lack of killer instincts is the problem at all. He's won a lot of tournaments and showed no mercy to his buddy Jack.

His problem is his poor record in the bigger events and it definitely gets under his skin. People talk a lot about it , especially on social media and forums and we know from Judd that he takes them comments to heart. He also gets involved in a lot of debates on Twitter.

He needs to win the Worlds,UK's,Masters, Tour Champs and better do it quickly. Winning tournaments like Gibraltar or Northern Ireland Open is a nice bonus and good to increase your ranking tally but they dont have that much of a huge impact on your legacy.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby orky

Haven't read any of the comments yet on this thread but good question. What I will say is he can win another 5 6 or 7 raking events this season which aren't either the UK and Worlds (also includes not winning the masters) and it will be a poor season for him in the sense that it will enhance his Tin Pot Terminator nickname. One world, masters or uk trophy this season will be worth 5 6 or 7 smaller tankers, just my opinion. And the longer he goes without winning any of the big 3, especially the worlds, it will become harder for him to do so. The players these days are just so good, any dip in form and anyone can goble anyone up. It's happened to Trump at the Worlds the last couple of years and I'd include Robertson in that - the way things are going I wouldn't be surprised if neither add to their sole world championship win. They go into the Crucible with a really good season and aren't able to produce when it really matters, because of the pressure of being a top player on great form and expected to win. The players around them are too good; any slight dip in form and it neutralises the so called gap in ability or expectations. Snooker is sometimes like pool these days the players really are that good and there's not a lot of margin for error at all.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby orky

Some really interesting comments and hard to disagree with some of them. Snooker has changed over the last X amount of years in the sense that almost everything counts as a ranking event. When you look at it like that, all the more reason the so called majors (World, UK and Masters) are now even more important than they were. Players can now pick and choose which events they enter, it's almost like tennis or golf and ultimately it ends up being the most majors you win is how your career is defined. Judd Trump is an unbelievable player but I would quite comfortably, at the moment, have him a good level or two below the likes of O Sullivan, Higgins, Selby, Hendry, Davis and Williams, no doubt about it. He needs a few more major titles to be somewhere near them. We're not talking about peak standard, if we were Davis probably wouldn't even be in the top 20 all time greats, I'm talking about standards and achievements combined.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Prop

Some excellent points being raised. Appreciate the contributions :hatoff:

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Juddernaut88

Hopefully Judd will win many more world titles, he needs to break all of Selbys records at the very least. It would be a massive massive shame if he was behind him. I believe he can do this!

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby orky

I genuinely think his best chance of winning the world championship this season is either by winning the UK or Masters or by having a poor season with no expectations going into Sheffield. The former would mean some kind of monkey off his back by claiming another major, and the latter as mentioned would reduce expectations and make him very dangerous because class as they say is permanent. Yet as mentioned previously, there are just so many good players around who at the very least are capable of derailing the favourite(s) at the Crucible. Wilson is no mug and he did a proper job on a below par Robertson who couldn't handle the pressure, likewise Murphy is a class act albeit still has a relatively one dimensional game, the man knows what it takes to win big titles and he didn't hesitate to pounce on Trumph and came storming back against Wilson and in the end ran Selby close. As mentioned there's very little between the top players, and standard wise there's very very little between probably the top 32 or 40 players. They can all knock in centuries for fun.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Wildey

Judd himself has gained from the massive money on offer for the World Championships going in to the 2019 World Champs he was 7th 567,000 behind Ronnie he won the World Championship hes only 30,000 behind Ronnie and after the second event of 2019/2020 he reached no 1 having won only 4 ranking events in a 2 year cycle compared to Ronnie winning 8 ranking events.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby rekoons

orky wrote:Haven't read any of the comments yet on this thread but good question. What I will say is he can win another 5 6 or 7 raking events this season which aren't either the UK and Worlds (also includes not winning the masters) and it will be a poor season for him in the sense that it will enhance his Tin Pot Terminator nickname. One world, masters or uk trophy this season will be worth 5 6 or 7 smaller tankers, just my opinion. And the longer he goes without winning any of the big 3, especially the worlds, it will become harder for him to do so. The players these days are just so good, any dip in form and anyone can goble anyone up. It's happened to Trump at the Worlds the last couple of years and I'd include Robertson in that - the way things are going I wouldn't be surprised if neither add to their sole world championship win. They go into the Crucible with a really good season and aren't able to produce when it really matters, because of the pressure of being a top player on great form and expected to win. The players around them are too good; any slight dip in form and it neutralises the so called gap in ability or expectations. Snooker is sometimes like pool these days the players really are that good and there's not a lot of margin for error at all.


orky wrote:Some really interesting comments and hard to disagree with some of them. Snooker has changed over the last X amount of years in the sense that almost everything counts as a ranking event. When you look at it like that, all the more reason the so called majors (World, UK and Masters) are now even more important than they were. Players can now pick and choose which events they enter, it's almost like tennis or golf and ultimately it ends up being the most majors you win is how your career is defined. Judd Trump is an unbelievable player but I would quite comfortably, at the moment, have him a good level or two below the likes of O Sullivan, Higgins, Selby, Hendry, Davis and Williams, no doubt about it. He needs a few more major titles to be somewhere near them. We're not talking about peak standard, if we were Davis probably wouldn't even be in the top 20 all time greats, I'm talking about standards and achievements combined.


Agree with everything you say here :hatoff:

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby KrazeeEyezKilla

It's interesting that the last four years have had a player enter the World Championship with five or six titles already won that season and each time they failed to win. It's possible that Trump like O'Sullivan would be better coming in under the radar a bit. You can't really get away with doing that every year though especially when you look at who has won the last few World titles

Williams - won two ranking titles plus Six Reds Worlds
Trump - won two ranking titles plus the Masters
O'Sullivan - won Shanghai Masters
Selby - won two ranking titles

Apart from the 2020 tournament which was played in unusual circumstances the World Champion will mostly be won by someone who has won at least a couple of titles already that season. So Trump might not be doing much wrong. He might be only able to win a World title every 3 or 4 years and a Triple Crown every season which he should have done last year given that he bottled the UK Final and missed the Masters. The Tinpot Terminator stuff which was semi-trollish to start off with ended up spreading and has got into Trumps head a little bit so that might have an effect.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Iranu

KrazeeEyezKilla wrote:It's interesting that the last four years have had a player enter the World Championship with five or six titles already won that season and each time they failed to win. It's possible that Trump like O'Sullivan would be better coming in under the radar a bit. You can't really get away with doing that every year though especially when you look at who has won the last few World titles

Williams - won two ranking titles plus Six Reds Worlds
Trump - won two ranking titles plus the Masters
O'Sullivan - won Shanghai Masters
Selby - won two ranking titles

Apart from the 2020 tournament which was played in unusual circumstances the World Champion will mostly be won by someone who has won at least a couple of titles already that season. So Trump might not be doing much wrong. He might be only able to win a World title every 3 or 4 years and a Triple Crown every season which he should have done last year given that he bottled the UK Final and missed the Masters. The Tinpot Terminator stuff which was semi-trollish to start off with ended up spreading and has got into Trumps head a little bit so that might have an effect.

So basically you wanna be the second best player of the season leading up to the Worlds :chin:

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Juddernaut88

It is certainly strange that no player that has won 5+ ranking events in the same season leading up the world championship hasn't won the world championship in that season.

Hendry 1990-1991
Ding Junhui 2013-2014
Ronnie O'Sullivan- 2017-2018
Judd Trump 2019-2020 and 2020-2021

Mark Selby came the closest, he won 4 ranking titles leading into the world championship in 2016/2017 and of course clinched the world championship to make it 5 ranking titles overall in the season.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby TheRocket

what makes it more strange is that those players who won 5 (or more) rankers going into the Worlds didnt even get to the one table stage.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Jack50

csprince wrote:trump has won 8 titles to selbys 5 in the current 2 year cycle.the worlds is overweighted we all know it. under the previous points system trump is 15475 points ahead.


The worlds is underweighted. Selby is the best player for me. 4 World Championships in 8 years and reigning champ. Plus he got robbed by Ronnie in 2020 in the semi.

Re: Judd Trump - Still The Best?

Postby Dan-cat

Jack50 wrote:
csprince wrote:trump has won 8 titles to selbys 5 in the current 2 year cycle.the worlds is overweighted we all know it. under the previous points system trump is 15475 points ahead.


The worlds is underweighted. Selby is the best player for me. 4 World Championships in 8 years and reigning champ. Plus he got robbed by Ronnie in 2020 in the semi.


He won less frames, yes.