Home Nations Series gets underway with the English Open

Steve Davis presented Liang Wenbo the trophy that carries his name

Last week we had the inaugural English Open being played at Event City in Manchester, with Liang Wenbo winning the title after thrilling wins over Stuart Bingham (6-5 in the semi-finals) and Judd Trump (9-6 in the final).
It was Wenbo's first ever Ranking Title and everyone could see how the 29 year-old was happy as he jumped high in the air after potting the final Pink in the last frame. Not just he had won his first Ranking Event and with that earned £ 70,000, but he had also put himself in line for the £ 1 million bonus that will be given to someone who wins all four Home Nations events, the next one coming next month in Northern Ireland. I never thought anyone could be able to win all four, and Wenbo haven't got the regualarity required to win more than one tournament in one single season in my opinion. Also, he might say he's not bothered about the millionaire bonus up for grabs, but being the only who can do that now he'll feel an amazing buzz in Northern Ireland and the media will all want a piece of him as if he was the World Champion.
Anyway, Liang Wenbo is still young in Snooker terms and now up to 12th in the Ranking, he should kick on from there and become a better player. Obviously he has a lot to work on his technique otherwise he'll never find that consistency, however the title also earned him a place in the Champion of Champions, and most likely guaranteed him in the World Grand Prix, The Masters and the Players Championship next year, it's a great time to get on a roll you'd think.

Overall the English Open had negatives and positives points but I can say I thoroughly enjoyed watching it. It was broadcast by Quest and Eurosport and it's great having yet another event on free-to-air television (Snooker have 11 events on free TV now) and they did a great job of it, with good action from the studio and a nice team of pundits. You can't hide though that the crowd didn't make justice to Snooker, it was good in the start of the week but after many of the top players lost on Wednesday we didn't have a very good attendance on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. The top players must've lost early because they probably focussed on the European Masters, which finished in Romania the day before the English Open started, with most of the top players going far deep into that tournament some of them got to the English Open shattered. It wasn't the only reason the crowd wasn't too good though, I heard people saying there was no advertising in Manchester at all and you wouldn't know there was a Snooker event going on until you arrived at the venue. Also, England may have far too many tournaments and people might wonder why would they come to the English Open when they can watch the Triple Crown events or the Champion of Champions instead.
To be honest World Snooker should've predicted that after they had the same problem with the Players Championship which was played at the same venue earlier this year, but we can't hide that there was many more postive points and the event in the end of the day was very enjoyable, not just because of the media exposure it had for being possibily the first part of a series that can potentially pay a Snooker player one of the biggest prize money an athlete would ever receive, but it had a very high standard, crowned by a 147 Maximum Break made by Englishman Alfie Burden early in the week. Burden of course enjoyed the two best weeks of his career having reached the Quarter-Finals of a high standard European Masters days before making his first ever Maximum Break, which was worth £ 12,000. The English Open also provided us an epic semi-final between Liang Webo and Stuart Bingham. Bingham led 4(11)3 before three consecutive Centuries took the match to a decider, which Wenbo won with a couple breaks over 50, showing he was going to hold his nerve this time, something he didn't manage last December when he got to the Final of the UK Championship.
In the Final Wenbo finished a 14 matches unbeaten run from Judd Trump, whom had won the European Masters 8 days before beating Ronnie O`Sullivan 9-8 in the Final. Ronnie O`Sullivan by the way, was knocked out by Chris Wakelin in the third round, but that didn't delete his impressive run in Romania the week before, highlighted by a 6-0 win over Neil Robertson in a match where he never looked like missing and I dare to describe as one of the finest sporting performances of all time.

Going back to the Home Nations series, the million pounds bonus always looked like an unachievable desire, and now only one man can even think of it, this means the next three events of the Series will be nothing more than another ordinary Ranking Events for the likes of Ronnie O`Sullivan, Judd Trump, Mark Selby and Neil Robertson, and I wouldn't be surprised if many of the top players pull out of the next two. The Northern Ireland Open will come after a busy period when the players will have played the International Championship, the China Championship and the Champion of Champions prior to it, also, most players like to take a week off when a big event is coming, and right after the Northern Ireland Open they'd had to head to York to play the UK Championship, the first Triple Crown Event of the season.
Then in December the Scottish Open will take place in Scotland, and the schedule won't be as busy, but it'll be very close to Christmas in a time of the year where most players like to chill out having finished the UK Championship. I might be wrong but I'm afraid some players could pull out of that one as well, which is a shame because I think the work Quest and Eurosport have been doing using the Home Nations brand has been great and I love watching events that have commantary from the studio with guest pundits and where the players come into it after their matches to concede interviews, I think it gets people more excited about the matches. World Snooker should maybe offer a £ 100,000 for a player who could finish top of a "Home Nations Order of Merit List", that'd connect the four events even more considering that after the Northern Ireland Open finished the million pounds bonus talk will be over because Wenbo probably will not win that one. I also think that bonus could count towards the Rankings, considering every professional is allowed to enter all four events of the Series, that would encourage the players to enter every event - that's a matter of opinion though. However I think they could still maintain the £1m bonus on offer in case someone wins all four events, something I don't believe we'll live to see anyway.


Well we must wait and see then what the rest of the Home Nations Series will be like, I can say I really enjoyed the English Open and I think the Series was a great idea, although there's room for improvement.
It's time to forget about the Home Nations Series for now though, and start looking forward to the International Championship, which starts next Sunday (23rd October) in China. It's always a good event that marks the beginning of the most important half of the season and it's time for the players to find their best form with tournaments such as the Champion of Champions, the UK Championship, The Masters, the Welsh Open and the World Championship getting nearer. Do not forget that you can keep in touch with every Snooker-related news by following us on Facebook! Thanks for reading 😉