Last year, the final of the Under-19 Billiards Championship was held over and played as part of the EASB Snooker finals at Newcastle. Considered to be something of an unsuccessful experiment, this year the event reverted to it's traditional format and was played out in full alongside the Under-16 and County Team Championships at the Breaks Club in Lincoln.
Defending Champion, Robin Wilson took the title for the fourth time, and in so doing, set a new record for the competition. He had previously shared the honour of most Under-19 Championship wins with Steve Naisby (1983-85) and Willie Thorne (1971-73), but this latest win puts the seventeen-year-old out on his own.
However, this all looked to be a very remote possibility as he started his quarter-final match against Matthew Sutton who, with an early break of 87, established a very big lead. Few players, even at senior level, could have hoped to overcome Sutton in a one-hour match faced with this deficit, but Wilson, to his credit, managed just that and finished winner by 62 points.
Peter Gamblin, who was attempting the enormous task of winning no less than three National titles on the same day, started well with an impressive 404-202 win over Billy Bousfield which included breaks of 73, 59 and 55. Michael Donnelly, who was also going for a "double" fared less well against Jimmy Chambers and despite a break of 48 went down 309-222, Chambers making the best break of the round with a 74. Teessider Darren Clark completed the semi-final line-up, a run of 53 being the feature of his 305-208 win over Calvin Daws.
Clark was less successful against Jimmy Chambers who dominated their semi-final match to win 322-144. Chambers, again looking solid, contributing a break of 56. Robin Wilson having struggled in the previous match now scored freely with some exhibition billiards to end the involvement of Peter Gamblin. Breaks of 82, 53, 52, 51, 45 came from the Teesside star as he ran up the day's best one-hour aggregate of 441 in a 263 point victory.
Although always in front, Wilson found it difficult to shake off a tenacious challenge by Jimmy Chambers over the early part of the final. Then a break of 65, followed soon afterwards by another of 42, opened a gap of 112 points on the scoreboard. Wilson maintained this advantage to the end and eventually finished a 354-193 winner.