Riley's Northern Open Billiards Championship

North Ormesby Institute, Middlesbrough

9th-13th November 1997

Teesside saw competitive tournament action after a lapse of eight years, since the Marton Country Club last staged an event.

The world's top four players were seeded into the second round amongst the 28 entrants. Eugene Hughes proved to be the opening round's highest scorer, while Bob Close, Alok Kumar and David Causier found conditions to their liking with 800+ totals in the 2 hour games. Robby Foldvari averaged 45 points per visit in that round.

Chris Shutt scraped home by only 4 points against Arun Agrawal to set up a mouth-watering clash with World Champion Mike Russell.

Mike was back in his native Teesside to face the player who had bettered all but one of his nine scoring records in the Teesside Boy's League and who had recently beaten him at Darley Dale.

Tournament Director Alan Chamberlain reports a spectator audience of 300 watched the match that produced averages of 45.5 and 55.2. Chris played the game of his short pro career, but ran out of steam as Mike overtook him in the closing minutes.

The game produced an aggregate of 1,558 points with the players scoring at the rate of 13 points per minute.

Hughes dried up against Foldvari, while Roxton Chapman and Peter Gilchrist almost clocked up four-figure totals.

Regional TV cameras were present for the first of two visits on the day of the quarter-finals that saw Russell break the 1,000 point barrier, then Gilchrist smash it with a 1,327 score that included three double and four single century breaks.

Roxton Chapman defeated David Causier with a tournament best break of 457 when the Peterborough player had looked destined for defeat.

Geet Sethi was humbled by an impressive Foldvari, but the Aussie then lost to Gilchrist in the semi-final, while Russell accounted for Chapman.

An all-Teesside final in the area regarded as the hot-bed of billiards, brought the TV cameras back to the venue, and healthy crowds to spectate.

Russell averaged almost 84 points in the opening session to swamp Gilchrist and end the contest, but thankfully not the spectacle, as the pair concluded with runs of 440, 233 and three other centuries in the last session.

Sunday 9th-10th November

Wednesday 12th November

Thursday 13th November