Wow, I don’t even know where to start with this one. Shortly after the conclusion of tonight’s play I was made aware that the News of the World (a British newspaper for those of you not familiar), will be running with a story tomorrow alleging that John Higgins has agreed to lose frames in return for a monetary reward. Click below for more information and links to the relevant articles…
For the allegations in full and a link to the relevant video footage, please click:
Due to the sensitive nature of the articles I am not going to comment on the allegations themselves but when I heard the news I was both shocked and in all honesty gutted because this is the absolute last thing that snooker needed at the moment.
As someone who writes this blog not as a reporter or a paid journalist but as a fan of the sport, I am keen to see snooker thrive and to have the world number one embroiled in such a story on the morning of the World Championship final is a significant blow to the credibility of the sport, not to mention very unfortunate for both Neil Robertson and Graeme Dott whose brilliant runs to the final will no doubt be overshadowed by this.
Hopefully more information will come out, indeed judging from the quotes of both Higgins and Mooney within the second of those two articles it would appear that as ever there is more than meets the eye to this story and I would not like to speculate further.
I just hope that the matter is dealt with appropriately by the relevant people and that the damage to the image of the sport can be kept to a minimum while the truth can come out…