ENGLISH GRAND MASTERS BILLIARDS TOURNAMENT
The Atack Snooker Centre, Nuneaton.
Sunday 5th March 2000
The final stages of the Grand Masters Billiards Tournament were once again held at the Atack Snooker Club, Nuneaton, by kind permission of Mr. Bob Coales.
Gareth Wakeford was immobilised by a back complaint on the morning of the competition and was unable to take part. The news was delivered to the organisers personally by Michael Wright, who continued to be helpful by staying on to give Tony James - Wakeford's intended opponent - a warm up game.
In the quarter-finals there were comfortable wins for Richard Lodge, David Rees and Peter Shelley. Peter had put up a disappointing performance the previous day in the CIU National Billiards at Batley, being eliminated by Darren Kell. He had left that venue muttering "Someone will pay" and we didn't have to wait too long to find out who he had in mind. A sparking performance against the unfortunate Bill Andress saw Shelley put together a two hour aggregate of 788 which included breaks of 65, 141, 77 and 50.
In the semi-finals Peter Shelley had a much closer win over Tony James, breaks of 82 and 78 helping him to a 58 point victory. Richard Lodge had a more comfortable win over David Rees and looked to be coming into his best form with a string of 50+ breaks.
The final was played on the club's match table and the shaved cloth seemed to cause problems for Richard Lodge. Peter Shelley however, managed to adjust to the changed conditions more readily, making his second century of the day with a run of 128. Additional breaks of 86 and 64 were enough to see him through to a comfortable victory Last year's Champion and EABA committee member, Mr. Stephen Crosland, thanked the referees and markers for their invaluable assistance and introduced Mr. Allan Hughes OBE the Association's treasurer, who presented the prizes. The highest break of the tournament was one of 188 made by David Rees in the earlier stages. All matches were two hours duration.
| Richard Lodge 61 | 513 | Tony Henke 54 | 303 | ||
| David Rees 68, 65, 51 | 581 | Ronnie Haigh | 272 | ||
| Tony James | w/o | Gareth Wakeford | |||
| Peter Shelley 141, 77, 65, 50 | 788 | Bill Andress 57 | 415 |
| Peter Shelley 82, 78 | 466 | Tony James 63 | 408 | ||
| Richard Lodge 69, 67, 58 | 488 | David Rees | 339 |
| Peter Shelley 128, 86, 64 | 686 | Richard Lodge | 402 |