Saudi Arabia Masters: Why snooker's newest tournament is already second behind the World Championship for players
Published 28/08/2024 at 08:08 GMT+1
Eurosport commentator Dave Hendon will be calling the shots at a brand new tournament this week, the Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters. It has already been labelled the 'fourth major' of the sport, but in his latest column, Hendon argues it will very quickly shoot up to second spot behind the World Championship. The action will be live on Eurosport and discovery+.
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The new Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters - which begins on Friday on discovery+ - has been handed the status of snooker’s ‘fourth major’, but many players will already regard it as second in the pecking order behind the World Championship.
The biggest tournament ever staged outside the UK, the Riyadh event boasts a £2.3 million prize fund closely in line with the game’s annual Crucible marathon, and with the same £500,000 winner’s cheque.
In terms of ranking points and players’ bank balances, these nine days in Saudi will be one of the defining periods of the whole season and potentially transformative for careers.
It’s also evidence of an increasingly global strategy by World Snooker Tour, whose stated aim going forward is to make snooker more international with deeds rather than words.
They already occupy a strong position in China, with five events staged there this season plus the likelihood of the World Grand Prix moving to Hong Kong. But there are other worlds to conquer, or at least other parts of the world.
Over the years, ranking events have been held in India, Australia, Bulgaria, Latvia, Belgium, the Netherlands, Bahrain and sundry other outposts without establishing a firm foothold.
Tournaments have merely come and gone. The challenge, therefore, is to lay down roots and ensure long-term relationships with countries where there is interest in snooker rather than brief flings.
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None of this is straightforward. The interconnected worlds of commerce, broadcasting and sport move quickly. WST, like any sports body, have had to follow the money to keep up.
The new Saudi Masters is part of a 10-year deal between Saudi Arabia’s Ministry for Sport, the country’s snooker federation and Matchroom, the parent company of WST.
It includes snooker and nine-ball pool, whose World Championship was staged in Jeddah in June - and where the first prize was four times that of the previous year.
These sports are following football, boxing, golf and others by taking advantage of the huge financial opportunities in the Kingdom.
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Debates continue as to the ethics of such an association but professional snooker is played in the real world, not on social media, and it would surely have been the end of WST had they not signed this agreement.
If the players discovered they had turned down the fortunes offered for this and potentially other Saudi tournaments, a breakaway would have been highly likely.
WST’s role is to provide commercial opportunities for the game and its players. Even if its prize money does not rise, the Saudi event alone will be worth close to £25m to the circuit’s coffers over the next decade, a drop in the ocean to some sports, but certainly not to snooker.
The sport now has a golden chance to establish itself in the Middle East, where there has not been a ranking tournament for 16 years.
There has also been talk of a big event in Qatar, possibly as early as this season, as the tour continues to evolve and spread its wings beyond dear old Blighty.
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WST has successfully restored snooker to China with events that boast large prize funds and where players are treated like royalty. Kyren Wilson pocketed £177,000 for winning the inaugural Xi’an Grand Prix last week.
However, competitors – including those from China itself – still have to schlep to qualifying venues in Leicester and Barnsley to secure places in the final stages thousands of miles away.
By contrast, the Saudi Arabia Masters is historic. For the first time, 144 players will be at the venue so the early rounds will be played in the same setting as the final, rather than in an anonymous sports hall in another country.
There are also wild cards for seven Saudi players, similar to the 16 wild cards given to Chinese hopefuls at the 2005 China Open in Beijing.
One of them, Ding Junhui, won the title, sparking a snooker boom the fruits of which the sport is still enjoying.
The Saudi players are not yet of this standard, but it will be a terrific experience for them. Ziyad Al Qabbani is just 14 and in the first round will take on Stan Moody, a veteran at 17.
Small complaints about this and that continue, but snooker’s position in a competitive and changing world is healthy.
Prize money on the professional circuit will reach at least £19m this season, a record. The wealth is not shared equally – it never is in sport – but significant rewards are there for those who are successful.
Many players, fans and pundits have said they want snooker to grow in prestige, for prize money to increase and for the game to become more global. All three of these boxes will be ticked in Riyadh.
On the table, there are plenty of subplots to follow. Judd Trump has returned to the top of the rankings for the first time in three years but, because of the big money and points available, six other players could replace him by the end of the tournament.
The top 16 are seeded into the last 32 but will not earn any ranking points if they lose at this stage. It adds to the pressure for players out of form, such as Luca Brecel.
The 2023 world champion's current projected end-of-season ranking is 58th, only six places above the relegation zone. A lot can change between now and the end of the campaign, but defeat in Saudi Arabia would be a major blow to the Belgian.
Ronnie O’Sullivan won the invitational event staged in Riyadh last March and is a natural favourite in high-prestige tournaments, but he ran out of steam in Xi’an, where Wilson defeated him in the semi-finals.
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Mark Allen will be determined to bounce back after losing his No. 1 spot to Trump while Mark Selby, so often the master of brinkmanship, will want to restore some confidence having lost two deciders and another close match from the season’s first three events.
Riyadh could be the setting for John Higgins and Trump to make the 1,000th century breaks of their careers. Higgins is poised on 998 and Trump on 992, so the race is well and truly on to become the second man to achieve this milestone after O’Sullivan did so in 2019.
Victory, or even a run to the final, for a lower-ranked player would propel them up the ranking list and get them into the other prestigious events which lie ahead, including the Champion of Champions, Masters and the three Players Series tournaments.
So there is much to play for in what promises to be an exciting tournament which is both historic and highly significant for snooker’s long-term health and hopes of expansion.
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Stream the 2024 snooker season, including the Saudi Arabia Masters, live on discovery+
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