CueSport TV - The Blog

Today see’s the delayed launch of GB9 Leagues a new amateur league structure for 9-ball pool players in the UK.

I was originally involved when this was first tried in the UK and after 12 months due to lack of support from sponsors and venues it failed to get beyond 12 months.

This time under the tutelage of Tony Weafer, a player on the GB9 Ball Tour and successful businessman, the league structure has much more planning and impetus to be successful behind it. Tony has worked tirelessly with Rileys (the UK’s leading pool and snooker provider) to bring them on board en masse. What this means is that the leagues will launch in around 100 venues simultaneously in January 2010.

It is an important time for such a scheme to get started, Britain as a nation has been achieving great results on a professional level with the likes of World Champions, Darren Appleton and Daryl Peach plus excellent performances from the likes of Imran Majid, Karl Boyes and more recently Chris Melling and Craig Osborne.

GB9 Leagues in my opinion will help us further strengthen our position internationally by developing the game and the interest at grassroots level. Yes, it will be full of amateur players wanting to have some fun, and why should it now be? However, it will also be a proving ground for young players and players moving across from other cue sports like snooker and English Pool.

Never has there been a better time in the UK’s history of 9-ball pool than now. Our professionals are performing better than ever and our official tour has announced plans to move into hotel venues for 2010 and beyond.

I wish the leagues every success and will actually be using them to get myself playing pool regularly again. The prize money, the county selection and ultimately spots on the GB9 Tour are all reasons why this will be a success.

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June 20th 2009 will see the very much anticipated £1000 per-man 10 ball challenge between Raj ‘Hitman’ Hundal and Ricardo ‘Indiana’ Jones.

Raj Hundal, the 2005 World Pool Masters Champion and regular on the International tournament scene, is rarely seen playing in one-on-one challenge matches. A player that is flamboyant and exciting and believes in hitting the break hard will come up against a UK based player he has known for over 10 years.

Ricardo ‘Indiana’ Jones is the house-pro at top Cambridge pool venue Mickey Flynn’s and is regularly seen playing challenge matches against some of Europe’s top players. Most recently Ricardo lost a very tight match against Dutchman Alex Lely. This particular money match went hill-hill. Jones, who has also represented the UK in the World Pool Championships in the past is probably regarded as the underdog on paper.

Jones recently commented “…alot of practice is required because I know I’m gonna have to produce a near fautless display to win…I, like him [Raj Hundal] consider myself part of the old-skool, the way American Pool used to be played with powerful breaks and great shot making.”

It is going to be an absolutely cracking match and Ricardo Jones is not a player to be underestimated and Raj will have to work hard if he is to win the match. There is due to be a return match and this is already pencilled in for Hounslow, the home of Raj Hundal, but lets get this one out of the way first.

The match is being played for £1000-per-man and starts at 7pm (UK time) it is a race-to-25 that is expected to go close to the wire - the match is being shown live on pay-per-view by WebTV channel Cuesport TV. You can purchase the match from just £2.95 ($4.75) which will allow you 24 hour access to the channels subscription service.

Visit: Cuesport TV for further information.

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The poor maintenance of pool tables seems to be a recurring theme in the UK at the moment. On one hand Rileys (the largest pool table operator in Europe) have gained a table sponsorship deal from Coca-Cola that will see the American pool tables covered in red cloth emblazoned with the Coca-Cola logo.

You can read the details here: Cloth Colours Get Worse!

I don’t personally like playing on red cloth and I certainly don’t like playing on cloth with big logo’s emblazoned on it either. There are however two sides to this argument. Rileys would argue that gaining a sponsor means the tables will be maintained more regularly, a bonus to any player wanting to play on the American Pool Tables. What you have to remember is that American Pool (by this I mean the 9ft tables) is still a massive minority discipline in the UK. The majority of people using the tables in Rileys do so for fun and don’t even use the tables for the right reasons.

Would this be accepted in the USA? Probably not but then there are far more players playing the game that understand the game and have been educated in their use.

The only way table conditions for the ‘professional game’ (I use the term loosely) will be improved is if they are moved away from club venues - an expensive and difficult task logistically.

The other occurence I found on CueClubInternational (formerly UK8ball and I prefer that name!) under the thread Tour Tables and Sponsorship

I can kind of sympathise with the Rileys argument but for a genuine professional tour like the IPA claims to be this is unacceptable. Tables are brought into a venue for only 6 tournaments in the year and they cannot be maintained or even recovered for each event. I will not get into the sponsorship element of the post as what is done with sponsorship funds is of course at the discretion of the organisers.

Tables for a professional event should be recovered for every tournament, this happens in Professional American Pool and in Snooker. Snooker players would be first to complain about the standard of the table conditions and rightly so.

What is wrong with pool in the UK? I ask for your thoughts!

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