Day 37 - Snooker

Given enough time, people are more often than not won over by snooker. It's great. Every shot is crucial. Throughout my various house shares, people who originally assumed it was boring end up getting into it, to the extent that I'll come back home and they're watching without me.

I completely understand how it looks boring. Hours on end of an undynamic green visual, it's not a far stretch from looking at a two dimensional image. Throw in the overweight, unhealthy looking old men and the most understandable immediate reaction is this is likely to be the most tedious thing imaginable. 

But as with many sports, a large proportion of interest derives from internal politics. The characters. Like naming a pet, once you form allegiances the attachment has begun.

If you want to show someone who is unaware of how some snooker matches can be different, this year's two semi final's are the perfect example. One semi final containing two attacking younger players, one of which a debutant and the other never previously having won a game at the World Championships. In this game the players immediately got down and took their shots, barely any consideration time. Just straight at it. It also contained one of the greatest comebacks ever, Luca Brecel coming from 14-5 down to win 15-17. 

The other semi final was always going to be and was indeed an extremely drab affair, almost exclusively because of Mark Selby, a man who purposefully slows the game down to a tedium with the strategy of disrupting any momentum his opponent can have. Ironically, despite being arguably the most dour man on the planet, his nickname is "The Jester". It isn't purposefully ironic, it's just because he's from Leicester. He must have the lowest viewing figures by far for a four time world champion. His match finished at one in the morning last night. He is the extreme favourite to beat Luca Brecel, a man who has proclaimed to have, after each win this tournament, stayed up with his mates getting really drunk until 8am. Hopefully Selby's soul destroying tactics enforcing a 1am finish means he had a bedtime similar to his alcoholic opponent and this works against him.

The final begins today (and ends tomorrow). It has been a great tournament and provided the perfect distraction from a difficult few personal weeks. Anyway my main point is, snooker isn't boring!