Announcement

**Sam** · 04-01-2022, 06:04

Just to be clear, the post above is a long way from being exhaustive: I've deliberately left out all the various US state open championships and some invitational events that aren't as obvious 'landmark' pro tournaments as the ones above. I've also had to not list anything happening in Asia, because the big tournaments over there (which I believe are mostly based around the Philippines and Japan) either haven't been scheduled yet or aren't of enough interest to the largely US-based sites I've compiled the above post from. My general sense is that the top Filipino pros tend to travel to the States for tournaments and that most of the money they make at home is from money matches against other top pros, for which they can win (or lose) rather more than the pint a British reader might bet on a frame with their friend down the pub, or the slightly more serious hard currency our US posters might have seen staked on games in their local pool halls.

Anyway, I've got a gin and tonic next to me now, so on with our new glossary additions, as promised in the OP.

Bank pool
What it says on the tin. 'Bank' was explained in the 2021 thread glossary: it's a double, in UK parlance – the player uses the cue ball to hit the object ball into the rail, and the ball then rebounds across the table into a pocket on the opposite side of the table. This is a call pocket game: if you pot the ball into a pocket other than the one you called it in, you lose your turn. Balls can be potted in any order – the idea is simply to make more banks than your opponent (generally speaking each rack is a race to see who can be the first to make five balls). Players take it in turns at the table, with a player's innings ending when they miss a shot. At the end of a player's innings, any balls they've potted are spotted back on the table and the next player comes to the table. This can be played with a fifteen-ball rack (in which case each rack is a race to eight balls, rather than five), but is more commonly played with nine balls, racked in 9-ball formation (but without it mattering what the order is), which is the professional standard. Of all disciplines it's probably the stickler's favourite, in that only totally clean banks are allowed: you can't kick (i.e. the cue ball has to hit the object ball first, never rail then object), you can't play combinations/plants (i.e. the cue ball has to hit the object ball that is being potted) and if the object ball goes into the called pocket off another ball, even just brushing by it, it doesn't count and the player's innings ends.

One-pocket
Like bank pool, you can hit any ball you want. The big difference with one-pocket is that each player is 'given' a pocket at the start of the match (or, more correctly, the player breaking chooses which pocket they want to shoot into before they break). The two pockets used – one for me, one for you – are always the two bottom pockets; that is, those at the same end of the table as the rack. So I'll break, and choose the bottom right corner. That means you're shooting into the bottom left corner. If I make a ball into my pocket, I shoot again. If I don't, it's your turn. If I make a ball into any other pocket on the table I lose my turn unless I also make one in my own pocket on the same shot. Of course, if I send a ball into your pocket, I lose my turn. A scratch (me potting the cue ball) gives you ball in hand behind the head string (BrE: in the baulk area), rather than from anywhere on the table as in most varieties of pool. Any foul results in the loss of one point, and if I've potted something, the spotting of a ball (this is also the case for bank pool).

14.1 straight pool
If you've seen The Hustler you might remember this one. Just pot as many consecutive balls as you can! No rules about what you can hit first, no rules about what order balls have to be played in. The game starts with a full rack of fifteen balls, with no set pattern to how they're racked. Almost every shot in 14.1, including the break, must be called. The exception is if you're playing a carom or a combination. It's also the only 'US'-style pool game where you'll see a snooker-style break: you don't want to leave your opponent with an easy shot. After the initial safety exchange comes to an end and I've left you with a shot you can make, your aim is to pot the ball you've called and then get position to pot another, followed by another, followed by another ... and so on until there's only one object ball left on the table. At this point, you'll re-rack the fourteen balls you've already potted – the top of the rack will be two balls side by side – and then if everything's going to plan you'll be able to pot the object ball that was left from the first rack and carom into the pack for a chance at continuing to pot balls until it's time to re-rack again, and so on and so on. A foul results in a point being taken off your score, and of course missing a shot results in your opponent coming to the table. Pro games these days are normally played as a race to 125 or 150 points, from what I've seen (I don't watch a lot of it, but it is good fun), but it's not unusual for them to go for much higher numbers. The all-time record was held for a long time, and perhaps still is, by Willie Mosconi (sound familiar?) who ran 526 consecutive balls over 36 racks. Having tried for ages to beat this, 2006 US Open 9-ball winner John Schmidt ran 626 balls in 2019. He's not without his critics, because Mosconi's record was set in a match whereas Schmidt wasn't playing an opponent: he was just quite deliberately trying to beat Mosconi's record, and starting again each time he failed. And he'd been trying, on a regular basis, for twelve years! Against that, Mosconi's record was set on an eight-foot table whereas Schmidt's was set on a modern full-size nine-foot one. On reflection, I think I'd rather play Mosconi at straight pool if you gave me the choice, because Schmidt is still alive whereas Mosconi's been dead for 28 years, so would definitely be an easier opponent.

Carom billiards
I've never played this game but God it's mesmerising to watch. This is played on a ten-by-five-foot table with no pockets The most common variety, and the one that will be played at the World Games, is three cushion. The game is set up with three balls: a white cue ball, a yellow cue ball and a 'neutral' red ball. I'll play with the white cue ball; this means you've got the yellow one. When I shoot, I've got to play the white cue ball in such a way that it hits one of the other balls, bounces off at least three cushions/rails and hits the other ball. The order of contact doesn't matter for the first ball and the three rails, but it must contact the second ball only after it's come off at least three cushions. If I succeed, I get a point and shoot again. If I fail, I lose my turn. When that happens, you come to the table and try to do the same thing, except that rather than hitting my white cue ball with your cue, you're hitting your yellow cue ball and my white one becomes one of your object balls. This game sounds complicated but once you've read these rules it's actually incredibly easy to follow: I finally sat down and actually watched a match just a week or so ago and bloody loved it. It's played on very fast cloth which means the players can draw some beautiful patterns with the cue ball. While simple to follow it is, clearly, incredibly hard to play: if you manage to average 1.5 points per innings over the course of a match you're playing to top-level pro standard, apparently, and that certainly seemed to be borne out by the game I watched.

**Sam** · 11-01-2022, 05:02

Today was big announcement day from Matchroom. Some stuff to get through. I've updated the OP with their full schedule.

To take one of the less grandiose announcements first, they confirmed that Matchroom are adding two new events to the calendar in 2022: the UK Open (which we all knew about; see my OP) and the European Open. This makes a total of eight 9-ball events promoted by Matchroom during 2022: Premier League Pool (the new name for Championship League Pool), the World Pool Masters, the UK Open, the World Cup of Pool, the World Pool Championship, the US Open, the European Open and the Mosconi Cup. Their info document says that they might add other events during the year. The European Open will be held somewhere in Germany in mid-November.

The other main development is that Matchroom's previously barely used world rankings (which were based only on the five Matchroom singles tournaments – the World Cup being a doubles event – and to which no one really paid attention other than using them as a basis to select the first two players on each team for the US and Europe at the Mosconi Cup) are being rebranded as the Nineball World Rankings and massively expanded: in conjunction with the World Pool-Billiard Association (WPA), they'll now take in all of Matchroom's singles events, as well as the 9-ball section of the Derby City Classic and the Euro Tour competitions. The top 32 will be set out by a Rankings Committee for 2022, who'll monitor results throughout the year to try to ensure that the rankings reflect performances, given that the number of other events on the circuit means probably no one will play every 9-ball event (for example, a look at the schedule I've put in the OP throws up the disappointing realisation that the final day of the US Open 10-ball, the whole of the US Open 8-ball and the first day of the US Open One-pocket are going to clash with the World Pool Championship). Players will earn rankings points points based on prize money won in the events monitored, which will be split into three tiers according to the prize pool. In the future, the rankings will be used to seed events.

Some brief details of the main Matchroom events this year:

Premier League Pool – a non-ranking event featuring sixteen players: the top twelve from the Nineball World Rankings plus four wildcards. Everyone will play everyone else across five days, after which the bottom six are eliminated. The remaining ten all play each other again over two days, after which four more players are eliminated. The remaining six all play each other again on a single day, following which the bottom two are eliminated and the final four play off for the title.
World Pool Championship – a 'Blue Ribbon' (sic) event featuring 128 players: the top 32 from the rankings, 50 allocated by the WPA and 46 wildcards. US$500 buy-in. Sixteen groups of eight players each play a double elimination group stage to arrive at the last 64, from which point it's a straight knockout.
World Pool Masters – a non-ranking event featuring 24 players: the top 20 from the rankings plus four wildcards, with the top eight in the rankings seeded into the last sixteen. Straight knockout. Traditionally this has been the event where Matchroom have sought to really challenge players: it was the first event to go down to 4-inch pockets, which judging from Emily Frazer's recent pronouncements is going to be the standard across Matchroom's events this year.
UK Open – a Major event featuring 256 players: completely open as long as you've got the US$250 entry fee (my reticence to travel in times of Covid, combined with the knowledge that I'd be lucky to pot a single ball, means you'll have to wait a few years before I make my debut with an OTF sponsor's patch, I'm afraid). The top 32 in the rankings will be seeded through the double elimination opening stage, which continues as far as (and including) the last 32. From the last sixteen onwards it's straight knockout.
World Cup of Pool – a non-ranking Scotch doubles tournament featuring 32 teams: the WPA will nominate sixteen nations and the top eight nations represented in the rankings will get invites, as will eight wildcard invitees (the Matchroom info document is actually a bit self-contradictory about this; the description of the tournament differs slightly from the info table beneath, so I'm guessing a bit). The top sixteen in the rankings (I'm guessing going by the ranking of the stronger player in the pair) will be seeded. Straight knockout.
US Open – a Blue Ribbon event featuring 256 players. Open to all who are happy to pay the US$750 entry fee (a third barrier, to add to the travel and the being shit at pool, to my participation). Exactly the same format as the UK Open described above. Or rather, the UK Open is the same format as this, because of course they've copied the US Open format for the UK.
European Open – a Major event featuring 256 players. Open to anyone who can pony up US$250 to enter (you'll have to wait a few years for my and etc. and so on). Venue yet to be confirmed, but it'll be somewhere in Germany so Joshua Filler will be the home crowd favourite. The info sheet mentions matches will be a race to nine, so presumably the UK Open will be the same.
Mosconi Cup – you know what this one is.

Mosconi Cup qualification for American and European players will rely more heavily on the rankings this year than in previous years: at the end of the US Open 9-ball both teams will announce their first three players: the two highest-ranked players eligible and one wildcard for each side. Then after the European Open the final two players will be added to each side: one from the end-of-year rankings and another captain's wildcard.

I really like these announcements. I'm no big fan of Barry Hearn or Matchroom, but it's good to see them following through on their promise to work with other promoters and make the rankings more coherent. There's a lot of talk in the announcement video (embedded at the bottom of this post: content warning for Barry Hearn) about raising standards (and thus marketability) by allowing more players to earn a living from the game, and there's a lot to that: a look at the AZ Billiards Money Leaderboard for 2021 shows everyone below 21st in the ranking earning less than US$35,000 for the year, and while it's not an exhaustive list that doesn't strike me as a hell of a lot given that if you're competing at that level you've got to live in a first-world country, presumably pay tax on your winnings and travel a lot (as well as paying your way into a lot of events). I just hope they don't plough so much into 9-ball that players start sacking off 8-ball and 10-ball events entirely, although hopefully Predator and the WPA tripling the prize pots for the Pro Billiards Tour 10-ball events (see my OP) will stave that off – given the WPA are on board with Matchroom's new rankings, it seems in hindsight like they bumped up the 10-ball prize funds in the knowledge that Matchroom are going big with 9-ball.

From the sounds of it (reading around a bit about stuff that's been said elsewhere by Frazer and other promoters), Matchroom are being pretty easy with requirements for this year, but are making sure partners know they'll want stricter standards in the future: no race-to-four matches, events all held on nine-foot tables with four-inch pockets and so on.

**Sam** · 11-01-2022, 05:21

And your first couple of on-the-table bits of news for the year: the big headline last week was that the GOAT, Efren Reyes, took part in the Iron City One-pocket tournament in Birmingham, AL. He finished fifth, going out to eventual winner Josh Roberts (not a name I've heard of), who beat last year's World Pool Championship runner-up Omar Al-Shaheen of Kuwait in the final. Skyler Woodward (7th) and Roberto Gomez (4th) were the other big names involved.

There was another Kuwaiti involved at the business end of a tournament at the Turning Stone Classic 9-ball event, as Abdullah Al Youssef lost to Jayson Shaw, who then lost to the Russian Fedor Gorst (not a name I think I've mentioned so far, but possibly the European most unlucky to miss out on a Mosconi Cup place last year) to be sent to the one-loss side of the draw, where he met Al Youssef again. After going 5–0 down, Shaw eventually won 9–7 to earn a rematch with Gorst in the final. In that final he trailed 8–3 and 9–4 before rattling off seven straight racks to lead 11–9, and eventually got over the line 13–10 to claim his seventh Turning Stone Classic title (an event record). Sounds like a hell of a game.

**Sam** · 11-01-2022, 07:31

And if anyone wants some classic action to while away the time here's a match I watched over the last couple of nights: Jayson Shaw v Darren Appleton (ignore the US flag next to Shaw's name; they've gone by country of residence. Both are Brits) at the 2015 Accu-Stats Make It Happen invitational (I found out tonight that Accu-Stats was set up by the same guy who promotes the International Open 9-ball tournament). Absolutely cracking match here.

**Sam** · 13-01-2022, 04:55

OK, so perhaps all those other threads on Sport discuss games you know more about and have more interest in. But you know what they (I assume, mostly) don't have? Discussion of competitions you can watch from the comfort of your own home, free and legally! The first stop of the US Pro Billiard Tour 10-ball started today in Arizona, and what I didn't know when I wrote the OP, but found out this afternoon, is that a bunch of matches each day are being streamed free on the World Billiard TV YouTube channel. The previous live matches are all up to watch 'on demand' as well, of course – and it's worth noting there are breaks between roughly every other rack, and between sets, and there's a bit of stuff before and after, so you can fast forward a bit if you're not watching live and watch in less time than the video running time will have you believe. Covid has affected the lineup a bit, apparently, but it's still a strong field, with US Mosconi Cup players Chris Reinhold and Tyler Styer, European stars including Albin Ouschan, Mario He, Denis Grabe and David Alcaide, and some of the top Asians including Naoyuki Oi and Carlo Biado all in the draw. A lot of players are over in the States getting ready for the Derby City Classic, which kicks off in just over a week, so it's worth looking out on YouTube for matches in other competitions involving other top players here and there as well.

The format of the matches is an unusual one: two sets are played, each a race to 4. Win both and you win the match; if it finishes 1–1 in sets the match goes to a shootout. The 10 ball is spotted (on its own spot, not the foot spot*) and the cue ball placed on the head string**, anywhere up to one diamond out from the side rail. Player 1 tries to pot the 10 into the far corner from where they're standing (no banks or kicks allowed, and of course you can't scratch either), then player 2 tries to do the same. This goes on for four turns, with the cue ball changing sides of the table for each turn (players shoot from the same side on each turn). If the score's level after four turns, the shootout becomes sudden death and the cue ball is moved one diamond closer to the head rail.

* The foot spot is the spot where the 1 ball goes when the balls are racked to play normally.
** The 'baulk' line to BrE speakers, which on an American pool table is normally not actually marked (although EDIT: I've just watched Mario He v Albin Ouschan from earlier and noticed for the first time that it is in fact marked, albeit faintly, on these tables), but runs between the second diamonds down from the top end of the table.

**Sam** · 15-01-2022, 05:20

We were denied seeing Jayson Shaw take on Earl Strickland at the Mosconi Cup by Strickland's vaccine refusenickery, but they met at the Turning Stone Classic last week, and Billiard Network have uploaded that one. This is a race to 9.

**Sam** · 15-01-2022, 05:40

And in other news, registration for the UK Open opened today, and the 256 available spots sold out in under an hour. Matchroom's press release says that world no. 1 Albin Ouschan, no. 3 David Alcaide and no. 4 Shane Van Boening will all be present – which of course implies that Carlo Biado (the no. 2) won't be there. It'll be interesting to see in the first couple of rounds how many of the British entrants are actually 9-ball players, and no doubt there'll be some focus on whether any snooker players have decided to sign up (Emily Frazer said on Matchroom's podcast the other day that she'd had messages from a few of them asking whether they were allowed to play, and had replied that of course they are, it's an open event).

In less exciting news, on Saturday I'm heading into the centre to buy myself a new cue tip, which I'll be fitting probably some time next week (having cut the old one off last weekend and taken ages trying to get the top of the ferrule as flat as possible by hand). I've fitted one tip before, and that was about four years ago on my first, cheap (equivalent of about �25) cue, so I'm rather nervous about putting one my nice cue (which cost about twelve times as much as the first one) for the first time. But I'm not aware of any local folks who can fit them, so I'll be taking it extremely slowly and referring frequently to a very good YouTube video, and crossing my fingers every step of the way.

**Sam** · 15-01-2022, 06:47

And if you don't have time for the thrilling Shaw v Strickland match two posts above but want some entertainment all the same, on Friday Matchroom uploaded an old World Cup of Pool match from 2007, in which an unfortunate Croatian pair got (and this barely even counts as a spoiler) taken to the cleaners by perhaps the best doubles pairing in pool history, Francisco Bustamante and Efren Reyes of the Philippines. The table is so uneven it throws up the only instance I've ever seen of a team losing the lag because the cue ball crossed into the other team's half of the table, but some of the play in this is lovely. Years later, in about 2017 or 2018, when Reyes was basically retiring from the top-level game, he did a European tour and as part of it he and Bustamante (who are best friends off the table) played some exhibition doubles matches against top-level pairings of a similar vintage to themselves. There's one somewhere on YouTube – I think the opponents are Earl Strickland and I want to say Ralf Souquet – where Bustamante pots his ball and leaves Reyes – quite deliberately – in a position where he can see the next ball but is totally out of position for it, and then Reyes does something ridiculous to make it and leave Bustamante perfect for his next shot. Then Bustamante leaves Reyes screwed again, and Efren once again gets out of it. The whole time, they're both pissing themselves laughing. I'd like to think the genesis of that dynamic was born with the position Reyes gives Bustamante 34 minutes into this match (and, indeed, you'll see him do it and then start to chuckle when he sees where he's left the cue ball for his teammate).

**Sam** · 17-01-2022, 05:52

Fedor Gorst has started 2022 in very impressive fashion: after losing to Jayson Shaw in the final at Turning Stone last week, he went one better by successfully defending his Arizona Open 10-ball title in Saturday's final against Roland Garcia.

The next major event is the Derby City Classic, which kicks off on Friday.

**Sam** · 18-01-2022, 19:33

Barely two weeks after I added to the glossary with post 2 of this thread, including an explanation of 14.1 straight pool, John Schmidt / Willie Mosconi's record high runs have been beaten: a couple of hours ago, Jayson Shaw completed a run of 714 (51 racks), blowing Schmidt's 626 out of the water – and in competition, at that! I'm hoping there'll be video available soon.

**Sam** · 19-01-2022, 04:22

My new cue tip is now attached to the cue. I managed to spray superglue all over my hands, but fortunately none landed on the cue and there was enough still in the tube to stick the tip down. It's now resting for 24 hours so the glue cures fully. The ferrule is wrapped in tape to bulk it out to the same width as the tip (which is 1mm thicker than my cue) and stop the glue dribbling down the side of the shaft, so on Wednesday evening I'll be peeling off all the tape then getting the utility knife and some sandpaper out to get the tip down to the same width as the cue. Then it'll be ready to be shaped into a nice dome and I can start the nervous probably several-week wait* until I get to play with it and find out whether it falls off and I've got to do it all over again (only with the tip now cut precisely to size meaning zero room for error in placing it on the shaft).

I was going to furnish you all with a photo, but given the board is going offline for an upgrade that should include self-hosted images in about twelve hours' time, I'll post tonight's pre-cut-and-shape photo tomorrow afternoon and then the end result later in the evening. But I'm optimistic about how it's going to look.

*Because I don't fancy taking public transport to the pool hall, or indeed being in the pool hall, while omicron is in full effect.

**Sam** · 20-01-2022, 05:57

Tip finished! I was going to bore you with the promised photos, but apparently we can't upload jpegs. It looks really good though, considering how nervous I was about totally fucking my cue up. Can't wait to give it a table test.

**Sporting** · 20-01-2022, 06:18

Thanks for these posts, by the way. I don't have anything of interest or import to add, but enjoy learning more about the game.

**Sam** · 20-01-2022, 06:50

No problem! It'll be nice if other people want to post, even if only to ask me things, but really I'm just treating it like a blog – trying to make sure I add something every few days seems like (and so far this year, is proving to be) a good way of making myself follow what's going on more closely.

**Sam** · 22-01-2022, 05:14

Two more additions to Matchroom's ranking events for this year: the Kremlin Cup, which was previously a 10-ball event, is changing to 9-ball and will count towards the Nineball World Rankings, and in the USA – where some fans and players have been complaining American players don't have as many opportunities to win ranking points (prize money) as the Europeans, the National Billiards League has signed up. They too have previously run 10-ball and 8-ball events, and from the sounds of what their head honcho says will continue to do that, but are also adding two 9-ball events to their calendar, one of which will be near Atlantic City right before the US Open.

The Derby City Classic started today. The big surprise is that Efren Reyes has turned up, and is playing in all three divisions. He's unlikely to add to his all-time record of five overall wins, but it's always nice to see him. The TV tables at the Classic are streamed on PPV, annoyingly, but if you keep an eye on Carlo Biado's YouTube channel (Carlo Biado TV oficial, or something like that) he's livestreaming his own matches from his phone/tablet on outside tables in the banks competition – two to enjoy from today's action if you can find them.

And a group of fans and friends have banded together to hire an immigration attorney in the States to help Dennis Orcollo apply for a more appropriate visa and get his five-year ban from entering the States overturned. Apparently he was using something called a visitor visa, which is the one normally given to sportspeople to allow them to enter the country semi-regularly and pocket money earned from winning events, but which isn't really meant for sportspeople who are entering as regularly, and winning and much, as Orcollo tends to (he finished 2021 in first place on AZ Billiards' money list for winnings during the year, with around US$140,000 just from the events AZB were able to verify his winnings for). From the sounds of it he'd carried on using the visitor visa because no one had ever told him he should be using a different one until he was deported at the start of the month (see final paragraph of my opening post on this thread).

**Sam** · 22-01-2022, 05:27

Oh, and Premier League Pool will now take place in Milton Keynes rather than Leicester, and will run from 14 to 21 February rather than the previously scheduled 13 to 20. No word on the Matchroom website as to why.

**longeared** · 22-01-2022, 08:21

Possibly to do with a change to the snooker calendar - the European Masters from February 21st to 27th has been rescheduled from Furth to Franchise Arena in Milton Keynes because of Covid restrictions in Bavaria. Might suit Matchroom to have both tournaments hosted in the same place if there are shared resources in any way.

**Sam** · 23-01-2022, 05:37

Ah, referees would be the most likely shout there I would think, at least among the visibly obvious things to us viewers – Marcel Eckhardt might well be officiating in both competitions.

**Sam** · 25-01-2022, 07:39

The twelve participants for Premier League Pool to enter via the Nineball World Rankings have been confirmed. The players ranked 2, 8, 9, 13, 14 and 16 aren't travelling – given that those are Filipino Carlo Biado (2), Taiwan's Ko Ping Chung (8), Chang Jun-Lin (13) and Ping Chung's brother Ko Pin-Yi (16), and China's Wu Jiaqing (9) and Liu Haitao (14), I'm guessing UK entry visas might be an issue for them (none were named in Matchroom's press release regarding the UK Open entry places selling out in under an hour either, which given Biado is the reigning US Open champion caught my eye at the time). The players are (with their Nineball rankings):

Albin Ouschan (Austria) (1)
David Alcaide (Spain) (3)
Shane Van Boening (USA) (4)
Max Lechner (Austria) (5)
Aloysius Yapp (Singapore) (6)
Naoyuki Oi (Japan) (7)
Joshua Filler (Germany) (10)
Eklent Ka�i (Albania) (11)
Alexander Kazakis (Greece) (12)
Omar Al-Shaheen (Kuwait) (15)
Jayson Shaw (Scotland) (17)
Oliver Szolnoki (Hungary) (18)

Four more players to come as wildcards. The next four down on the rankings are American Skyler Woodward, Spain's reigning Euro Tour champion Francisco S�nchez Ru�z, Denis Grabe of Estonia and Chang Yu-Lung of Taiwan ... so Miesko Fortuński of Poland, who's world no. 23, should be waiting by the phone. There are some big names in the few ranks right below him, though, including Dennis Orcollo, so it might be interesting to see whether Matchroom fancy throwing him a bone given he can't play in the States at the moment. There might also be a few jokes if they decide not to give Niels Feijen a wildcard; he did a great job on commentary at the Mosconi Cup and on their podcast they've made no secret of wanting to get him in the studio again, but as world no. 25 at present he might be hoping to play!

**Sam** · 25-01-2022, 20:03

The first competition at the Derby City Classic has ended, with Joshua Filler beating Fedor Gorst (a third final this year for him!) in the final of the Big Foot 10-ball tournament, which is so called because it's played on a 'Big Foot' 10-foot table. The AZ Billiards write-up of the semis and final is terribly written, but I think Filler won 11–9.

The banks competition is down to the last seven. Jayson Shaw drew a bye into the semis. The other quarters are an all-American tie in Tony Chohan v Evan Lunda, Poland's Miesko Fortuński v Gorst and Pijus Labutis of Latvia v the Canadian John Morra. And the one-pocket competition started a couple of days ago.

**Sam** · 27-01-2022, 07:47

Much to my delight (although I've not watched either of them yet) Accu-Stats Video Productions, who have a vast archive of old matches and are in charge of the PPV streaming at the Derby City Classic at the moment, have decided to stream selected matches of the one-pocket tournament on their YouTube channel. Mike Delawder v Dee Adkins (never heard of either of them) was first up, and Skyler Woodward v Billy Thorpe (who are good friends and were both involved in the Mosconi Cup in 2020 – and Woodward of course was involved last month as well) is there too. Not sure whether this will just be a few random matches, just these two or a regular daily thing for the rest of the event (they didn't stream any of the Big Foot or the banks), but keep an eye on their channel if you're interested.

As for the banks, those were won by ... shock horror ... Fedor Gorst. So that's four events entered in 2022 and four finals reached for him (two wins, two losses). Well ... sort of. He actually lost to Tony Chohan in the semis, but had a buy-back (which the Derby City Classic allows – I wonder how or whether Matchroom are going to account for that in their Nineball rankings ...). So Chohan played ... another semi? ... against Shaw and lost it, and Shaw then met Gorst in the final. Hmm.

In the banks, Naoyuki Oi beat 2015 and 2016 banks champion Alex Pagulayan and Mario He tonked Billy Thorpe, among other results.

**Sam** · 30-01-2022, 07:00

An enjoyable freebie from Derby City: a six-player bank pool 'ring game'. Each player has paid US$1,500 to play, and the six take it in turns to attempt bank shots (player A shoots as many as possible until missing one, then player B does the same, then player C etc.). At the start each time a player makes one they collect US$50 from each of their opponents, and as the competition goes on the stakes are raised. Obviously once a player runs out of chips they're out of the game. This match features two very strong amateur American players, three of the best all-around players in the world in Jayson Shaw, Omar Al-Shaheen and Skyler Woodward, and arguably the best banker ever in Billy Thorpe. A really cool introduction to bank pool.

**Sam** · 30-01-2022, 07:24

Elsewhere at Derby City, which finished on Saturday night, Fedor Gorst won two more titles: he added the one-pocket title to the banks he won on Tuesday, and guaranteed himself the all-around 'Master of the Table' title (and a bonus of US$20,000) before the 9-ball tournament even wrapped up. He's the youngest player ever to win Master of the Table, I think. That's 'think' because the AZ Billiards article I've read, when read grammatically, says he's the youngest player ever to win both the banks and one-pocket, and that he's won the Master of the Table as a result, but as with the one the other day it's very poorly written (it says he 'apprehended' the banks title!), and if the Wikipedia results are accurate he's the only ever player to win the banks and the one-pocket at Derby City in the same year, so my guess is that they meant to write he's the youngest ever Master of the Table.

In the 9-ball, which ended about an hour ago (I had to look on forums rather than any news sites to find the result), Spain's reigning Euro Tour champion Francisco S�nchez Ru�z took down Joshua Filler 9–3 in the final. The 9-ball at Derby City might be the biggest tournament in pool in terms of entry numbers – over 400 players took part this year, against 256 entering the US, UK and European Opens (the organisers apparently set the prices so it's cheaper to pay to play than it is to buy a ticket as a spectator, which obviously encourages participation. On a lot of Carlo Biado's live streams of his own matches several surrounding tables are also in view, and while a fair few of them had the world's top pros playing on them, I also saw a few players who made me think I might not embarrass myself if I entered one year, if I gave myself a bit of practice ahead of it). This year's edition was also, of course, the first ever event at any venue to count towards Matchroom's new Nineball World Rankings, which should be updated in the next few days and start rolling from this point on. S�nchez Ru�z was 20th at the start of the tournament, and his run included wins over #1 Albin Ouschan, #3 David Alcaide, #4 Shane Van Boening and #30 John Morra, as well as not one but two wins over #10 Filler, so it'll be interesting to see how far he jumps when the new rankings come out.

**Sam** · 31-01-2022, 07:16

Turns out AZ Billiards had called the Master of the Table for Fedor Gorst slightly early due to some complicated maths: had Jayson Shaw reached the 9-ball final he would've taken it instead. But he didn't, so Gorst does indeed take that title.

I've also just had a quick scan of the historic winners' table on Wikipedia, and this is the third time in Derby City Classic history (i.e. since 1999, with no event last year) that all three main events (banks, one-pocket and 9-ball) have been won by players from the same continent, and the first time that no American has won one of them. I'm not sure where Gorst finished in the 9-ball, but given no player has ever won all three main events it'd be interesting to find out. As it is he's become only the second player to win any two of the three – Efren Reyes won 9-ball and one-pocket in 2005, and those aren't bad shoes to be walking in.

In short, Feder Gorst takes the coveted Player of the Month award for January, which is something I just made up and which has no meaning at all beyond this thread.

Next up, the European Masters from 10 to 12 February, and they're followed immediately by Premier League Pool, which kicks off in Milton Keynes on the 14th. Gorst wasn't one of the twelve World Ranking qualifiers for Premier League Pool. I suspect Matchroom will be all hands on deck to make sure he's offered a wildcard first thing Monday morning.

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Ouschan's Eleven – 2022 pool

Ouschan's Eleven – 2022 pool

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