Snooker is a cue sport played on a rectangular billiards table covered with a green cloth called baize, with six pockets: one at each corner and one in the middle of each long side. First played by British Army officers stationed in India in the second half of the 19th century, the game is played with 22 balls, comprising a white cue ball, 15 red balls and 6 other balls—a yellow, green, brown, blue, pink and black—collectively called 'the colours'. Using a snooker cue, the individual players or teams take turns to strike the cue ball to pot other balls in a predefined sequence, accumulating points for each successful pot and for each foul committed by the opposing player or team. An individual frame of snooker is won by the player who has scored the most points, and a snooker match ends when a player wins a predetermined number of frames.
Darren Morgan is a Welsh former professional snooker player who now competes as an amateur and is considered amongst the best in the world.
The Vierde Divisie, formerly known as Hoofdklasse is the second-highest league of amateur football in the Netherlands, and the fifth tier in general.
Clive Harold Everton was an English-born Welsh sports commentator, journalist, author and professional snooker and English billiards player. He founded Snooker Scene magazine, which was first published in 1971, and continued as editor until September 2022. He authored over twenty books about cue sports from 1972 onwards.
Ray Edmonds is a former English professional player of English billiards and snooker. He twice won the World Amateur Snooker title, and won the World Professional Billiards Championship in 1985.
The English Amateur Championship is an annual snooker competition, the highest-ranking and most prestigious amateur event in England. It is also the oldest and longest-running snooker tournament in the world, having been established in 1916, three years before the standard rules of the game were first formulated in 1919 by the Billiards Association and Control Club and 11 years before the first World Snooker Championship.
The European Pocket Billiard Federation (EPBF) is the European governing body for pocket billiards. EPBF is the European regional affiliate member of the World Pool-Billiard Association (WPA).
The World Snooker Tour (WST) is the main professional snooker tour, consisting of about 128 players competing on a circuit of up to 28 tournaments each season. The World Snooker Tour is administered by World Snooker Ltd, the commercial arm of professional snooker, which introduced the World Snooker Tour name, logo, and revised website as part of a 2020 rebranding. The principal stakeholder in World Snooker Ltd is Matchroom Sport, which owns 51 percent of the company; the sport's governing body, the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA), owns 26 percent. To compete on the World Snooker Tour, players must be WPBSA members.
James Cahill is an English former professional snooker player from Blackpool. Cahill first turned professional in 2013, aged 17, after winning the European Under 21 Championships, but returned to amateur status in 2017.
The Confédération Européene de Billard (CEB) is the European governing body of carom billiards and is affiliated to the world federation UMB.
The Canadian Amateur Championship is an annual snooker competition played in Canada and is the highest ranking amateur event in the country.
The 2015 UK Championship was a professional ranking snooker tournament that took place between 24 November and 6 December 2015 at the Barbican Centre in York, England. It was the fourth ranking event of the 2015/2016 season.
The Royal Dutch Billiards Federation was founded in 1911 to coordinate, within the Netherlands, billiards, pool and snooker. The union is affiliated with the Union Mondiale de Billard, Confédération Européenne de Billard and NOC * NSF. The Head Office is located in the Blokhoeve district of Nieuwegein.
The Welsh Amateur Championship is an annual snooker competition played in Wales and is the highest ranking and most prestigious amateur event in Wales.
The World Women's Snooker Championship is the longest-running and most prestigious tournament on the World Women's Snooker Tour. Staged 41 times since the inaugural edition in 1976, it has produced 15 different champions, six of whom have won the title more than once.
The Derde Divisie, formerly known as Topklasse, is the fourth tier of football in the Netherlands, which had its inaugural season as a third tier in 2010–11 and as a fourth tier in 2016–17. The league is placed between the Tweede Divisie and the Vierde Divisie, the third and fifth tiers of Dutch football, respectively. The introduction of the then Topklasse resulted from discussions between the Royal Dutch Football Association, the Coöperatie Eerste Divisie and the Centraal Overleg Hoofdklassers.
Joe Grech was a Maltese snooker and billiards player. A professional snooker player for various years from 1988 to 2000, he won the IBSF World Billiards Championship in 1997. First competing as an amateur in the 1979s, he competed in amateur and professional snooker and billiards championships in a career spanning nearly 40 years. He won the Maltese English Billiards Championship on 21 occasions including 13 successive titles from 2003 to 2015.
The Women's Billiards Association (WBA), founded in 1931 and based in London, United Kingdom, was the governing body for women's English billiards and snooker, and organised the Women's Professional Billiards Championship and Women's Professional Snooker Championship as well as amateur and junior competitions. The founding meeting was held on 13 May 1931 at the Women's Automobile and Sports Association. The meeting was chaired by Teresa Billington-Greig and appointed Viscountess Elibank as the first president and Mrs Longworth as the first chairman. The WBA ran amateur and professional billiards competitions starting from 1932, an amateur snooker tournament from 1933, and a professional snooker championship from 1934.
English billiards, known in Britain as just billiards, was developed by around 1800 as a combination of earlier cue sports. Matches are played either across specified time periods, or to a specified number of points. As of 1930, many billiard halls in the UK did not admit women. That year, the British cue sports company Burroughes and Watts organised the first edition of what would become the Women's Professional Billiards Championship and then announced a Women's Amateur Billiards Championship, later recognised as the World Women's Billiards Championship. The first rounds of the amateur tournament would be played at regional venues, with the regional winners qualifying for the semi-finals and final at Burroughes Hall in London. Ruth Harrison was the champion from 23 participants, and the highest break made was 28.
Patrick Delsemme was a Belgian snooker player from Liège. He has been named one of the greatest Belgian snooker talents ever.
Joris Maas