Betfred Premier League
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| See: Snooker tournaments |
The Betfred Premier League, formerly the Dr. Martens Premier League, is a professional snooker tournament, sponsored by the bookmaker Betfred. It has been running since 1987. The tournament is played in a league format over a number of weeks, normally from mid-September to early-December, around the other major WPBSA events. It is not a ranking event.
The total prize fund for the 2006 tournaments was £232,750 with £50,000 going to the winner. All matches are shown on Sky Sports in the United Kingdom and this coverage is syndicated to other networks around the world.
Contents |
[edit] Format of play
The league is an invitation-only event, contested mainly by players in the World's Top 10. The combination of players is chosen though to have maximum televisual appeal, so it is usual for a mixture of high-ranked players, upcoming youngsters yet to reach the top 10, celebrated older players now out of the top 10 and players with an appeal to international (i.e. non-UK) markets such as Asia or Australia to be selected. The players play each other once in a 6-frame match. Unlike other snooker events, a draw is a possible result in the league. 2 points are awarded for a victory, and 1 for a draw. At the end of the round-robin stage, the top 4 players in the league table go forward to the best of 9 semi-finals stage. The final is then played over the best of 13 frames.
The major difference from other tournaments is the presence of a shot clock. Each player has 25 seconds to strike the cue ball from the time the clock starts. This is determined by the timing official, and the clock normally starts when the balls have come to rest from the previous shot. The penalty for exceeding the limit is 5 points. Each player is allowed 5 time outs per match where the clock is stopped and they may have as long as they require to take their shot. A player is permitted no more than 3 time outs per frame.
[edit] History
The event started in 1987 with Steve Davis winning for the first 4 years. It has been dominated by Davis, Stephen Hendry and Ronnie O'Sullivan, who between them have taken 17 of the 22 titles in the competition's history. O'Sullivan has won the most titles, having won 7 in total.
[edit] Media coverage
From 1987 to 2004, the Betfred Premier League matches were recorded and shown as-live, initially by ITV until the early 1990s when Sky Sports took over coverage. Since 2005 all matches have been televised live by Sky Sports, the introduction of live coverage coinciding with a relaunch of the League.
[edit] Winners
[edit] 2006 tournament
The 2006 tournament was won by Ronnie O'Sullivan beating Jimmy White in the final 7-0 (this was the third successive whitewash by O'Sullivan in League finals having beaten Mark J. Williams and Stephen Hendry by 6-0 scorelines in the two 2005 finals). O'Sullivan also finished top of the league table with 11 points. The other semi-finalists were Ding Junhui, who had to pull out due to a conflict with the Asia Games (an event in which he went on to win the Gold medal; his place in the Betfred Premier League was taken by Steve Davis)[1] and Graeme Dott.
[edit] Results
[edit] Round-robin stage
| Player | MP | MW | MD | ML | FW | FL | FD | PTS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Ronnie O'Sullivan |
6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 24 | 12 | +12 | 10 |
 Ding Junhui |
6 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 21 | 15 | +6 | 8 |
 Graeme Dott |
6 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 18 | 18 | 0 | 6 |
| Jimmy White |
6 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 18 | 18 | 0 | 5 |
| Steve Davis |
6 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 17 | 19 | -2 | 5 |
| Stephen Hendry |
6 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 14 | 22 | -8 | 4 |
 Ken Doherty |
6 | 2 | 0 | 4 | 14 | 23 | -9 | 4 |
[edit] Knock-out stages
| Semi-finals | Final | ||||||
| 2 December – Wythenshawe Forum, Manchester | |||||||
| Ronnie O'Sullivan |
5 | ||||||
| Steve Davis |
2 | ||||||
| 3 December – Wythenshawe Forum, Manchester | |||||||
| Ronnie O'Sullivan |
7 | ||||||
| Jimmy White |
0 | ||||||
| 2 December - Wythenshawe Forum, Manchester | |||||||
| Graeme Dott |
4 | ||||||
| Jimmy White |
5 | ||||||
[edit] 2007 tournament
The 2007 event was contested by Ronnie O'Sullivan, Ding Junhui, John Higgins, Neil Robertson, Stephen Hendry, Jimmy White and Steve Davis. It ran from 6 September to 2 December.
In the semi-finals John Higgins beat Ding Junhui by 5 frames to 3, along with Ronnie O'Sullivan beating Stephen Hendry 5-1.
The final was a best-of-13 match eventually won by Ronnie O'Sullivan 7-4 over John Higgins.
This was Ronnie O'Sullivan's 4th successive final victory in this event, winning this event finals 7 times in total.
