OVER the course of the season I will be sharing my thoughts here on lots of things snooker related.
There’s so much happening on and off the table at present and the professional game is, and likely will be, changing more and more in how it’s structured.
That’s all for another day but for now my focus is on going for the hat-trick in the BetVictor Northern Ireland Open, which starts at the Waterfront in Belfast on Sunday.
The tournament has definitely come at a good time for me as I need something to ignite my season. Playing in front of the Waterfront crowd, where I have won the last two years, can hopefully provide that spark.
The first few months have been a real struggle. If I was to mark it out of 10 it would be a one or a two if I’m honest. I really don’t know where some of the uncharacteristically easy misses have come from.
Obviously last year was going to be a tough one to follow. Starting at a career-high three in the rankings I wasn’t focusing on who was coming behind me but I really wanted to find another bit extra that would push me even higher.
I’m always one for looking forward rather than back.
Maybe those wee changes haven’t really worked the way I wanted and have maybe set me back a little bit.
I have made a conscious effort this year to play a little bit quicker, not because of any criticism from last year, just to find a bit of fluency in my game as much as anything else. Maybe that has had an adverse effect.
However, it’s not a complete disaster and there’s nothing that can’t be salvaged and put right. The irony is that I have probably even over-achieved a bit with my results.
The fact that I’m still even in the top 20 on the one-year ranking list is a small positive and getting to the quarter-finals in Wuhan last week could also be seen as a step in the right direction.
The Northern Ireland Open had been a real struggle for me until I won it two years ago, as my results there showed.
I felt the pressure too much and I was playing for the wrong reasons. I have nothing more to prove now and I have repaid the fans now for all the heartbreak I caused them previously.
It took me a while to realise I should be playing for myself, not for the fans or my family and friends.
I made a conscious decision three years ago to treat it like any other event, I even stayed in a hotel, away from the club and my family. That helped me turn the corner.
I’m aware that if I win next week I will be only the fifth player in the history of the game to win the same ranking title in three consecutive years.
Ray Reardon, Steve Davis, Stephen Hendry and Judd Trump are the other four so it goes without saying that would be a nice group to be part of. But I have to win seven matches so there’s a long way to go.
It will just nice to be there and enjoy it rather than hating it as I did in the first few years I played in this event.
I enjoyed both of my final wins in very different ways. The one against John (Higgins) was brilliant because he has his own support in Belfast and I was just happy to be involved in that atmosphere.
It was one of the best I have ever played in and I would have said that even if I had lost. At 8-8 we both went out to toilet and said to each other ‘this is why we play.’
Last year against Zhou (Yuelong) I was able to relax and enjoy it more because I had a good lead. I made a century in the last frame and once the break got to 60 I was able to soak up the occasion and play a few exhibition shots for the crowd.
Locally, I’m delighted to have been asked to act as an ambassador for the Northern Ireland Billiards & Snooker Association and hope to be able to promote the amateur game as much as I can around my own playing schedule.
Spending more time at home than in the pre-Covid days makes it so much easier to do that.
NIBSA played a huge part in my career development as a teenager and nobody knows better than me the importance of a good structure for the amateur game to thrive and bring players through.
