A Day at the Races
Tony Done and his friend Paul Dunning have been regulars on the Mini-Prix circuit for about three years and both have become popular and respected performers. Tony was born in Trevallyn some 31 years ago but now lives in Chester where he is chief clerk at a branch of the T.S.B. He started playing Billiards at the local village hall when aged 15, learned by watching other players and made his first century when 20 - 106* in a local league match. More recently Tony has had his highest breaks of 143 in competition and 183 in practice. Tony plays in the Chester league and the Merseyside League K.Os. His opportunities for play are rather limited consisting of a couple of matches a week in the season, otherwise he gets little practice. He once got to the last 16 of the English Amateur but his best performance to date was in winning the Harrogate Mini-Prix of March 1988. In that Tournament Tony beat Ian Williamson in the Semi and Dick Watts in the Final. In the quarters Williamson had beaten Bob Close and Watts had ousted Bill Andress, so it was a very good performance. There are plenty of good players who have never won - and probably never will win - a Mini-Prix. Tony Done plays very little Snooker but has a break of 81 to his credit. He admires particularly the play of Norman Dagley and Mike Russell and his own ambition, perhaps the best of all sporting ambitions, is to, "Enjoy the game and be as good as possible."
Tony Done's travelling companion, sparring partner and friend is Paul Dunning, 30, also of Chester where he works as a Civil Servant. Paul has a hundred-break snooker playing brother, whilst his father is the current M.o.D Snooker Champion. Paul prefers Billiards and started when he was 15 in the same club as Tony and, like Done, learned something by watching other players. Paul also plays in the Chester League and the Merseyside K.Os but otherwise gets very little practice. He made his first century this year and his best in competition is 98. However, like a lot of other players, Paul's game is improving thanks to the Mini-Prix experience. He is a determined opponent demanding respect and his best performance was in winning the plate at Grimsby last year. He admires the play of Russell and is particularly interested in Bob Close's play for the way in which the experienced Middlesbrough man handles the all-round game. His ambition is to do as well as possible. There is another sporting side to this pair of Billiard players in that they are great aficionados of the turf - the kind that horses run on and generally travel to Tournaments on Saturdays to have a flutter before playing Billiards on Sundays. When travelling South they are becoming familiar faces around Sandown and Warwick and are, naturally, habitues of Chester. They tell some amusing yarns. They made a special effort earlier this year to get to Sandown to see Desert Orchid They left Chester in glorious weather only to run into snow down the motorway and find that the racing was cancelled. As the person they were staying with has not the slightest interest in either Billiards or Snooker the lads did not feel they could just head for the nearest Billiards Hall and so passed a rather miserable Saturday. On another occasion a nicely priced nag was doing its best for them only to lose the verdict in a photo-finish. It was only after they had left the course and torn up the slips that they found that the decision had been reversed. Ah well lads! you can't win 'em all, see you at the Billiards.
Record Break
Well, the lads were seen at the Billiards, Grimsby to be precise where, in the first round playing against Trevor Gent, Paul made his personal record break of 139. Paul went out by only four points in the second round to that good player from Bradford Alan Firth. Well done Sir.