It has been a long road but this morning saw the first four qualifiers emerge from the inaugural Q School. Congratulations to Adam Wicheard, Andrew Norman, David Grace and Robin Hull who will all now play on the professional circuit during 2011/12…
Final Round Results
Zhang Anda (CHN) 1-4 David Grace (ENG)
Adam Wicheard (ENG) 4-1 Fraser Patrick (SCO)
Andrew Norman (ENG) 4-3 Chen Zhe (CHN)
Robin Hull (FIN) 4-3 David Gilbert (ENG)
While all four matches were of interest this morning, the clash that stood out for me was that between Robin Hull and David Gilbert, two former top 48 players (top 32 in Robin’s case), who have both played at the Crucible during the past decade.
The match would more than live up to expectations as following breaks of 49 and 20 to give himself the first frame, Robin could do little during the next three as Gilbert forged into a 3-1 lead with runs of 83, 71 and 34.
Hull though used his experience to come back and not only level with breaks of 56 and 48, but then make 69 in the decider to secure a well-deserved return to the main tour.
While the result will be disappointing for David, it is a great story for Robin to be back on the tour three years after he last hung up his cue due to health problems including an irregular heartbeat. Having entered the European Championship back in 2009 shortly after taking his national title as reported at PSB at the time however, it is evident that Robin has continued to play the game to a reasonable standard and that he still has something to offer.
Andrew Norman at the 2009 English Open
That is also very much the case for Andrew Norman who despite struggling during 2009/10 as he was relegated from the circuit, is far from a bad player and will be hoping to take advantage of the far greater amount of tournaments on the calendar this coming season. Today he overcame talented Chinese youngster Chen Zhe in another high quality match at the Q School.
A second On Q Promotions player to make it through to the main tour is Adam Wicheard who hit three breaks over 50 this morning to overcome Scotsman Fraser Patrick. As a result Adam becomes the first player relegated from the tour at the end of the 2010/11 season to secure an immediate return to the top flight and it will be interesting to see if the experience that he was able to gain last season will help him to better things next time around.
Today’s final qualifier is Leeds’ talent David Grace who pulled off a great 4-1 victory against the ‘Mighty Mouse’ Zhang Anda to secure a return to the tour for the first time since 2008/9. As is the case with the other players David will be hoping to win more matches than he was able to previously on the tour but with the greater amount of events due to the introduction of the PTC he will surely have a much better opportunity to do so than when there were barely six or seven ranking tournaments.
So that’s a wrap from Q School one, did you expect those four to come through?
Stay tuned for my look ahead to event two which begins tomorrow…