Tour Survival 2015/16 – Player by Player

Lines3

As the nights draw in and the clocks go back, it is also that time of the year when I take a close look at the battle for tour places from the start of the 2016/17 season. As regular readers will be well aware, to fully understand how each of the current tour players are currently placed, it is necessary to analyse a number of different ranking lists and orders of merit.

With two of the biggest money events to come in the International Championship and UK Championship tournaments, today I take my first player-by-player look at the current state of play and flag up some of the surprise names with work to do if they are to remain on tour for another season…

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Tour Survival 2016: The Early Running

balls

Two ranking tournaments into the 2015/16 campaign, already it is possible to identify some of the players who are sure of being on the main tour next season and perhaps more importantly, those whose places are at real risk.

With every pound, dollar or euro to be earned during the remainder of this season likely to be crucial, today I take my customary look at the likely qualification criteria and look at some of those to follow over the coming months…

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2015/16 – Stories to Follow

Bingham4

While the wait goes on for information as to the various seeding cut-offs and other ranking information for the 2015/16 season, the action is now very much underway with the qualifiers for the Australian Goldfields Open this week in Crawley.

As was the case last year, it is interesting then to take a look at the current world ranking list and try to pick out a few potential stories that may well develop during the next months.

After all, already a year ago it was possible to see that Ding Junhui would have an excellent chance of claiming the world number one ranking (which he did in December), while players such as Stephen Maguire and Nigel Bond would have work to do in order to stay inside the top 16 and top 64 respectively…

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Playing Conditions – A Cause For Concern?

YorkarenaA year ago at the UK Championship, the talk throughout the first week was dominated by that of the suitability of the venue given the shift to a flat 128 format and in 2014, it has been a similar story, with both the sports hall and main arena coming under fire at various stages of the tournament.

Just as we thought that the subject had been exhausted however, Ronnie O’Sullivan injected fresh life into the discussion following his victory against Peter Lines last night, criticising not only the four-table arena set-up, but perhaps more significantly, the table that he had played his match on.

While last year the debate very much centred on the use of the sports hall, this time the debate seems to be far more wide-ranging, with conditions generally coming under fire and I therefore wanted to take a look at a few of the key talking points, with quotes from various players during their press conferences this week so far…

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News Round-up: Lines Wins Pink Ribbon, Carter Ranking Set To Be Frozen, Wildcards & More…

Lines

Following the conclusion of Q School and the qualifying events for the Wuxi Classic and Australian Goldfields Open, there are still another couple of weeks to go until professional snooker returns to our screens with the venue stages of Wuxi towards the end of the month.

That said, there have been a number of smaller news stories to come out during the last few days, so click below for a round-up of what you need to know…

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