Having earlier confirmed the return of the World Open on a five-year contract, World Snooker have also published the qualifying draw for the 2012 staging of the tournament which you can now view here at PSB. You will see that the draw appears slightly different than normal, an effect caused by the withdrawals of ten professionals including impressive newcomer Li Yan. Click below for a full list of absentees…
Those who have elected not to enter the event are as follows:-
- Igor Figueiredo
- Joe Meara
- Kacper Filipiak
- David Hogan
- Robin Hull
- Simon Bedford
- Scott MacKenzie
- Matt Couch
- Bjorn Haneveer
- Li Yan
In many cases the withdrawals are unsurprising, as pointed out in the comments section of my previous article, with the eight players to remain on the main tour via the PTC now largely decided (subject to the names eventually finishing inside the top 64 of the two-year ranking list), there is little incentive for those at the bottom of list to enter the remaining full-ranking events this season now and incur further expenses.
That said, it is surprising that rising star Li Yan has decided not to enter the event, particularly having just moved up into the top 64 of the world rankings for the first time at the latest seedings revision.
The qualifiers for the tournament begin this Wednesday 11th January 2012 from the World Snooker Academy in Sheffield.
Please note that the ranking points gained will not count as part of the new projected seedings list, eg towards the seedings for the World Championship which will be determined following the Welsh Open.