THE STRACHAN BRITISH OPEN CHAMPIONSHIP

Liverpool Billiards & Snooker Club (8th-11th March 1999)

The Players and Seedings

Australia
Robby Foldvari (5)
England
David Causier (6)
Roxton Chapman (4)
Bob Close (9)
Brian Dix
Peter Gilchrist (1)
Mark Hirst
Brian Morgan
Mike Russell (2)
Andrew Sage
Peter Sheehan
Chris Shutt (15)
Mark Wildman (16)
Ian Williamson (10)
Eire
Eugene Hughes
India
Arun Agrawal
Subhash Agrawal (11)
Satish Amarnath
B. Bhaskar
Michael Ferreira (13)
Devendra Joshi (7)
Manoj Kothari
Alok Kumar (14)
Nalin Patel (12)
Mukesh Rehani
Geet Sethi (3)
Ashok Shandilya (8)

The professional circuit arrived in Liverpool on Monday 8th March for the last ranking tournament of the present season. Early rounds were again two hours with only the final being increased to three hours. As defending Champion Peter Gilchrist took over as top seed followed by Russell and Sethi.

Although Bhaskar had managed to locate a flight to England in time for this event, both Ghandi and Goenka were still absent, providing walk-overs in two of the first round matches.

Mark Hirst appeared to be cruising to an easy win after establishing a lead of 167 points over Eugene Hughes with breaks of 62, 62 and 82. Then Hughes redressed the balance with a well-crafted break of 197 to set up a nail-biting finish. Approaching the bell, Hirst appeared to be back in control when he took the lead with a break of 38 before unexpectedly missing a pot red. This let in Hughes who played out time with 24 unfinished to win by just 7 points.

Neither Arun Agrawal nor Mukesh Rehani were troubled by their English opponents. Rehani's victory being more decisive than the score may indicate, Brian Morgan making the top break of the match with 64 at his final visit. Morgan, from Essex, is ranked 27th amongst the snooker pro's and was reported to have been practising with Steve Davis, a 200 break billiard player himself in his amateur days.

Chris Shutt struggled for most of his match against Mukesh Rehani, who mid-way through the match had forged a lead of 69 points, which he proceeded to hang on to with grim determination. Shutt eventually edged himself back in front, but it was only a final effort of 146 unfinished by the Teesside professional which made the game safe. Bob Close had an easier passage against Andrew Sage making a top break of 93 in a one-sided encounter.

Manoj Kothari, the 1990 World amateur champion, carved out a narrow, though well deserved, victory over Ian Williamson. Opening his account with breaks of 50 and 103, Williamson looked in good form, but thereafter could do little right as Kothari gradually caught him up and thereafter the lead changed hands on a regular basis. A break of 50 by Kothari at his penultimate visit was the decisive factor in his victory. Michael Ferreira, who recently received a lifetime achievement award at the Bombay Gymkhana for services rendered to the game of billiards, has been having a lean time on the professional circuit of late. Although he appeared to be in control of his match against Rex Williams for much of the time, late breaks of 60, 54 and 31 unfinished by the WPBSA Chairman were enough to see him through.

After a slow start by both players in the Hughes/Patel match, the game came to life when consecutive runs of 55 and 130 by the Irishman were countered by a 77 from Patel. Although Hughes continued to hold the advantage, Patel, with consecutive runs of 101 and 130, turned a deficit of 152 points into a lead of 77. This he maintained until the end, a break of 45 unfinished setting the seal on his victory. Peter Sheehan turned on the power in the second half of his game against Kumar, to make what had appeared to be a difficult match at one point, into an easy victory.

Arun Agrawal, with breaks of 90, 81, 88 and 102, dominated his game to establish an unbeatable lead over Mark Wildman. The Peterborough professional eventually put together useful runs of 114 and 64 unfinished as his opponent relaxed, but was not able to affect the result. Subhash Agrawal also entered the last 16 with an impressive victory over B. Bhaskar.

With a magnificently fluent compilation of 827, Chris Shutt recorded the highest break of his professional career and the second highest made under the new baulk line rule. When he unexpectedly failed at a fairly easy in-off into the top right-hand pocket there was a groan of disappointment from the audience who had calculated that he had just sufficient time to pass Russell's record of 957 and even perhaps reach the coveted 1,000 break. This result was a complete reversal of the crushing defeat which Gilchrist had handed out to Shutt only the previous week. His 827 break took just 53 minutes and additional runs of 218 and 110 helped him to a match average of 99.1.

After a slow start by both players, Ashok Shandilya progressed comfortably into the quarter-finals at the expense of Bob Close who saved his best until last. His fine effort of 172 unfinished still leaving him 356 points short of Shandilya at the bell.

Manoj Kothari came back well after an early break of 141 gave Devendra Joshi the advantage. Breaks of 72 and 89 brought the scores level before Joshi went away again with runs of 83, 94 and 83. A break of 127 by Kothari set up an exciting finish and in a game which could have gone either way, Joshi, with an unfinished run of 32, managed to edge home by just 20 points.

Roxton Chapman started the fireworks with a break of 217 in his match against Rex Williams. Williams responded with 149 and Chapman continued with 146 to establish a lead of 152. Williams however was finishing strongly and with an excellent break of 202 he went to the front again. Chapman just had enough time to win the match, but broke down on 57 allowing Williams to complete a fine victory by playing out most of the remaining time.

Nalin Patel's improving form was much in evidence as he registered a surprise victory over David Causier. Patel established a lead he would never lose with early runs of 121, 103 and 82, while for Causier, nothing seemed to go right. His highest break of the match was 75, and that coming at a time when the result was already a formality. If Patel's victory over Causier was a surprise, then Peter Sheehan's remarkable victory over World Champion Geet Sethi was an even greater shock. Sethi appeared to be returning to form after taking the World Matchplay, and had established an healthy advantage of 113 points over Sheehan. But a break of 108 at this point put Sheehan back into contention and he held his nerve over the last eight minutes for a 17 point victory.

The match between Foldvari and Arun Agrawal went right down to the line, with the Australian just getting the better of the final exchanges to emerge a narrow winner.

Subhash Agrawal must have feared the worst when Mike Russell ran in a break of 101 at his first visit, but in a disappointing performance, it was only late in the match, when Russell added a 185, that he managed put some daylight between himself and the Indian player. A 93 break by Agrawal threatened Russell once more and prompted a period of safety play by the World No.1. By the time Agrawal was allowed in for another break of 101 there was insufficient time to catch Russell's total.

Chris Shutt, although not in the devastating form of his previous match was still good enough to beat Ashok Shandilya. The Asian Games Gold medallist had every chance to win this encounter, but crucially he twice missed easy pot red's from the spot in the last twenty minutes, allowing Shutt to clinch the match by 114 points, with breaks of 162 and 86 at his last two visits.

Rex Williams held his nerve to win a close match with Devendra Joshi by 82 points. Joshi, whose lack-lustre performances this season will see him drop out of the top eight in the rankings, was unable to respond as Williams edged ahead in the last few minutes to book his place in the semi-final.

Playing with new found confidence, Nalin Patel, perhaps the most improved of the Indian contingent this season, defeated Peter Sheehan by over 400 points. Although making only one century, Patel scored consistently highly with breaks in the 80's and 90's to demoralise Sheehan and register a comfortable victory.

Mike Russell's performances to this point were not particularly inspiring for his supporters, and in his match against Foldvari he was showing signs of becoming frustrated with the Australian's tactical play. Trailing 155-190, Russell then signalled a sudden return to form, and ended Foldvari's hopes, by putting together a massive break of 603.

Rex Williams' best performance in recent years was in the 1995 Strachan British Open, when he defeated both Geet Sethi and Mike Russell before losing to Peter Gilchrist in the final. Any thoughts of going one better were soon crushed as Chris Shutt hit top gear, rattling in a two hour aggregate of 1,319 points. His early break of 350 would probably have been sufficient to clinch this match, but further runs of 192, 108 and 189 in successive visits made the result a formality as Shutt completely demoralised the former World Champion.

Russell was also involved in a one-sided match as he produced runs of 258, 238, 261 and 229 to amass an aggregate of 1,108 and set an impressive match average of 110.8.

Russell takes the British Open with possibly the best performance of his career in the final.

Surprisingly perhaps, Russell had never before won the British Open, but he took this opportunity to redress that omission by turning in possibly the best performance of his already impressive career. In a the first 90 minute session Russell came to the table just five times putting in consecutive runs of 134, 157 and 756 unfinished for a remarkable average of 270.

Continuing after the 15 minute interval, Russell´s concentration seemed to waver as he lost position several times while at top-of-the-table, but as he approached his opponent's high break of 827 his play became very careful and determined. Shortly after passing that figure he again lost position and missed a run-through in-off into the top left-hand pocket, the break terminating at 890 after 59 minutes. There was disappointment that he had not broken the magical thousand point barrier, but Russell demonstrated his potential when just two visits later he put together another huge run of 511. Two more efforts of 148 and 182 took Russell over the 2,000 mark and with Shutt completely overwhelmed with the proceedings, the final score of 2,195-335 was an accurate reflection of his dominance. His second session produced an average of 101.5 giving him a match average of 146.3. It is a pity that with just five tournaments a year and short format matches, Russell is not given a greater opportunity to develop his big break potential. Even so, all billiards enthusiasts will look forward to seeing if he can continue to improve on performances like this.

Russell took a cheque for £7,000 from the tournament, which included £500 for the highest break. Chris Shutt, having reached his second final this season, may have been disappointed to have take the role of spectator to Russell once more, but his overall performances have left nobody in any doubt that he has arrived in the top rank of professional players. He collected £4,000 from the sponsor's, Strachan.