CueSport TV - The Blog

Last week was manic, I left on the 23rd April (my birthday incidentally) for the long trip to Blackpool for the GB9 event at the Imperial Hotel. The long drive lasted 7 hours with traffic and I did it in one stint because… well just because I can!

I went up to my room at around 8pm and woke up the next day at 7am - obviously needed the sleep! Thanks for Tone Weafer for the two pints he had bought me prior to this, whatever he had put in them certainly did the trick!

The event itself was superb with some excellent pool played all weekend, the only problem for us was being moved from the main tournament room to the back room for the semi’s and the final on Sunday night. Big thanks to all on the GB9 team who helped move the kit to the other room and re-setup in around 30 minutes.

Videos from this event will be available shortly.

So, from Blackpool I made the trip east to Bridlington, the journey was made a it easier by having Jayson Shaw in the car who reached the semi-finals in Blackpool and needed to get to Bridlington to represent Scotland. Having a chat about pool on the journey certainly passed the time. I reached my hotel at 00:45 - they had waited up for me!

In my opinion there is not much to Bridlington, this is based solely on the walk from Rags hotel to the Spa so I don’t have much to go on in fairness, however, the Spa Theatre has provided us with the best Internet connectivity for web streaming over the past two years. This time was no exception with testing on Monday taking a matter of minutes.

The upload capacity of the line is excellent which meant I was able to stream the live content at 1200kbps, very high bitrate for live streaming!

Some good pool followed with some bad pool was the order of the week with a real mixed bag. Some great people made the week for me coming over and chatting, sharing a beer or two at the end of the day and generally providing me with some entertainment.

It was a very well-organised event (apart from putting the singles on late into the evening something that will have to be remedied for next year) and I think that everybody that took part and represented their country will come away from Bridlington feeling they have been part of something.

It was a shame that the event is no longer regarded as a World Championships, this meant less teams, but lets hope that the event can be re-invented next year to bring more teams to an awesome venue.

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Over the last few months I have been mentioning the Four-nations Blackball event that we are going to put on in Bournemouth, Dorset.

The only problem is that at the moment we only have three nations confirmed, Wales, France and Scotland.

If you are a) English and b) think you can play Blackball at the highest level then please contact me on enquiries@cuesport.tv for further information on this great event.

The dates of the event are 8th-9th May 2010 in Bournemouth Dorset.

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So we have it marked down, 8th-9th May, the first ever Four-nations Blackball Cup featuring teams from England, Scotland, Wales and France.

I have been talking about it for a while and have now confirmed all teams except for England (come on boys!)

The event is due to take place in Bournemouth, Dorset over the said weekend and it will become quite historic in its make-up. Not only will it be the first time the tournament has been held but the broadcast itself will also be a first for Cuesport TV and possibly even the world.

Originally every match was going to be shown back-to-back on one table, but due to the extra team this means we have to use two tables. But do not fear we have a plan!

Part of the reason for moving the event to Bournemouth is the fact that this is the first town in the UK to receive 100meg fibre optic broadband. What we plan to do will be amazing:

• Viewers will be able to choose a match from the two tables
• Each table will have two seperate live streams
• A viewer will be able to choose between SD & HD versions dependant on their own broadband speed

Not only that but I can also release the format that is going to be used below is an example:

• Wales (A) v France (A) - Best of 17 frame singles
• Wales (B) v France (B) - Best of 17 frame singles

If both teams win one of the singles matches then we go to a decider:

• Team Wales v Team France - Best of 9, alternate shot doubles

So that is the match format but the teams will also be playing a double eliminator across the weekend until the champion is crowned on the Sunday. Do not forget, this is a Blackball rules event.

Any thoughts and comments are appreciated.

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Well for the second year running we have covered the UPC-BUCS 8-ball pool championships. An event that this time around had just under 500 attendees. The best that the universities in the UK have to offer.

The standard of pool seems to have improved on last year especially in the singles. I must say a big well done to Warwick’s Jay Murphy here for his win over reigning champion Lee Morris in the final.

From my point of view, with the amount of events I have attended over the last two years, I would say that the tournaments promoted by the UPC are well organised, although I think the players in the singles would probably prefer longer matches. (Just an observation, time constraints are massive on an event of this size).

It was a good decision to move the UPC’s main event to Great Yarmouth at the Vauxhall Holiday Park, the park is well equipped for pool events, it already hosts EPA Inter-county, Interleague and other tournaments throughout the year. From what I understand the accommodation is also good value, although perhaps a little cold!

The only thing that seemed to be lacking in my opinion was provisions for food, unless you want fast food there is not a lot else available. It was a shame to see that the restaurant was closed all weekend as I feel it may have done some good trade. You then have to look at not only what the outlets are serving but also the price.

I understand business is about profit, but this has to be coupled with value. I don’t think any of the outlets particularly offered value. My eagle eye also spotted that with 500 people in the room the bar was rarely, if-at-all, busy. The main reason for this being the high beer prices, an average of about £3.40 per pint. Surely a good idea for the park to cut prices when they know students are around as town offers more choice and is far cheaper.

I don’t want to detract too much from the pool, the park does an excellent job of maintaining the tables which were lightning quick throughout the event. I did not hear one complaint about the quality of the tables, a rarity in pool tournament terms. In fact the majority of players I spoke to were singing the praises of the tables throughout.

Great Yarmouth as a town seems to have an excellent night life, and the town itself is far bigger than I actually thought, I imagine it is even better in the summer when it is somewhat warmer! Yarmouth must benefit greatly from pool tournaments as it brings an influx of people in off-season to spend money in bars. clubs and restaurants.

Roll on next year!

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I have already released some details over the proposed Tri-nations tournament. At this time it has already been extended to a Four-Nations with France confirming a team. There is also the possibility of Spain wanting to enter as well.

Although that is great news that teams want to play the events, it also poses somewhat of a dilemma.

Finding a definitive calendar is not at all easy as each promoter, tour, governing and nation seem to have their own with nobody compiling an overall calendar.

What I thought I might do is set one up that everyone can edit and add events to. Hopefully this would eliminate date clashes and would actually mean it is easier for players to know what is going on.

On the plus side the contact I have had from other nations encourages me as it shows that high quality Blackball events are required.

English/UK Pool, General blackball, calendar, dates, four-nations, tournaments

It has been a long time in the pipeline but tomorrow finally see’s us record the first edition of our new magazine show called ‘In the Frame’.

The 1/2 hour show, filmed in conjunction with Weymouth College Media School students, will feature news, interviews and competitions for fans of pool and snooker.

This edition will feature 2005 EUKPF Professional World Champion Ben Davies and top pool referee Mel Harley.

The show will be filmed between 1pm and 3pm tomorrow (28th Jan) at Snook’s in Weymouth.

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I have been contacted by somebody from the Scottish Blackball fraternity asking if I know of anyone that would want to play some money matches against Scotlands finest up in Glasgow.

Recently it has been clear to me (off the back of the Potts v Bale match) that Cuesport TV needs more high profile one-off matches.

This could be an opportunity for anyone so basically if you fancy testing your skills against some of Scotland’s best Blackball players and are prepared to play for high stakes then drop me a message. I will pass on your details.

This also goes for keeping us informed of any upcoming money-matches, we are interested to hear about each and every one of them.

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For some time now I have been toying with the idea of hosting events specifically for the Cuesport TV audience.

I never haide the fact that I feel Blackball is the better rule set when it comes to UK ’small-ball’ pool, and there are a lack of tournaments for these players to compete in as well.

It made obvious sense to me to promote an event of our own and I wanted to do something different that would show Blackball in the right light.

The first ever tri-nations tournament will take place this year and will feature two-man teams from England, Scotland and Wales.

The tournament will be exclusively live online at Cuesport TV and will feature players like Craig Marsh, Simon Ward and Andy Lucas, plus it is hoped World Masters Champion Scott Ross will compete for Scotland.

Through sponsorship from BilliardsBoutique.com the event will have £2000.00 prize money with the winning team pocketing it all and the title for 2010. If successful, which I believe it will be, then it will become an annual event on the calendar.

The format, date and venue are yet to be set in stone but dates around April/May 2010 are being considered.

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Rather than regurgitate something that is already written you can see the full press release here: 8-Ball Pool Super Tour Live. We are pleased to be involved in this tour as it means we can provide high quality pool for our viewers including numerous World 8-Ball Champions like Phil Harrison.

On the press release page there is a poll asking who will win this event, it is a tough question as one of the attractive things about this series is that anyone on their day could win. So far from three tournaments we have had three different winners and it is likely we will see a fourth winner this weekend as well.

Throughout the weekend we will be making score updates and results available not on the blog this time but over at our good friends Cue Club International, here you can get involved in live discussion and also make a few more predictions about the event.

The live coverage is available to paid subscribers only from 4pm on Saturday 21st November, the action (that starts at 12pm) will be free until that time, so feel free to dip in and have a look.

I am predicting Simon Ward to win this one, if he plays!

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Absolutely gutted!

We were supposed to be at the 8-ball Super Tour event this weekend and left this morning at 8.00am for the relatively short drive to Keynsham.

All was well until we reached Dorchester (about 12 miles) and then smoke started pouring out of the engine, I suppose in hindsight the temperature gauge being above the red should have been a sign, in fact if it could have gone any further round it would have been back at zero!

Pulling over was the answer and then loads of phone calls later we got the RAC out, this was £129.50 well spent! We had breakdown cover with our insurance but as we didn’t have the details with us nobody could help.

A trip to a garage in Dorchester confirmed the problem as the radiator. No replacement available until Monday and no courtesy car available until Monday either. Bugger!

We drove home and are still here, needless to say there will be no live coverage from the 8-ball Super Tour this weekend. We do apologise if this has cause anyone any inconvenience but it is unfortunately something we cannot help.

Hopefully we will be fighting fit next week so we can return to action.

Again our apologies.

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