Over 200 entered the 4 qualifying events with the aim of taking home not just the £10000 first prize and the invitation to play in the World Championship qualifiers, but the honour of competing against some of the game’s greats.
Peter Lines, won the first event in Newbury; Jonathan Bagley qualified from his home town of Leeds; Aidan Owens nipped over to Germany to claim his spot; and Patrick Wallace qualified in Dublin.
They then faced seeds 5 to 8 in Joe Johnson, Patsy Fagan, Tony Knowles and Willie Thorne. Only Joe Johnson made it through the first round in beating much fancied Patrick Wallace.
Seeds 1 to 4; Stephen Hendry, John Parrott, Cliff Thorburn, and Dennis Taylor entered at the quarter final stage but only the top 2 seeds made it through to the semis.
It looked like a strong possibility of an all Leeds final as Jonathan Bagley took on John Parrott and Peter Lines faced Stephen Hendry. Lines did in fact beat Hendry 3-0 but it took a black ball shootout for Parrott to overcome Bagley.
This set up the final where, no disrespect to John Parrott but, talk was mostly about the scoreline that Lines would win by and if he could keep up his record of not dropping a frame. Lines obliged and won 4-0.All credit to Jason Francis and the Snooker Legends team for putting this event on and Jason can now take a minute to catch his breath before starting the planning of next year’s.
Pictures courtesy of Monique Limbos. See more from the event here
