On Sunday 15th February in the SBI Academy in Carlow, Aidan Murray won his first ranking event of the season after beating Wayne Doyle in the final
First round matches in the top half of the draw seen John Downey beat Robert mc Crum in a close match with Robert recording a 49 break in the middle of the match, in the next match in the top half of the draw seen John Kehoe play steady billiards in beating Brendan Devlin, the bottom half of the draw seen our youngest billiards player in Ireland and great prospect Ciaran Doyle get a bye into the quarter finals,
The last of the first round matches was anyone’s game for most part with Aonghus mc anally and Jason Dowling until Jason near the end of the match had two good 40+ breaks to forge away from Aonghus,
The last 8 was set with Wayne Doyle having a comfortable win over John Downey, great to see John coming on at billiards in only his second full season, John Kehoe upped his game in the next round and played some quality billiards in beating 6 times Irish champion Larry Drennan, Aidan Murray had a comfortable win over Ciaran Doyle scoring a 100 break in the match, while Jason Dowling and Eugene Hughes played out the closest match of the day with nothing in it either way for most of the match Jason came out on top for another good win,
Semi-final 1 was Wayne Doyle vs John Kehoe both not getting into their strides and a lot of scrappy stuff there wasn’t a whole lot in it until Wayne getting the balls under control has a fantastic 125 unfinished break to seal his place in the final, the other semi-final Aidan Murray got of to a flying start with a 64 break and looked in command , Jason not getting much run of the ball stuck in and when he got his chances clawed back the deficit but just couldn’t get past Aidan before the time ran out,
Final was set for another clash of Wayne vs Aidan with Wayne unbeaten in the last 7 ranking tournaments and Aidan looking for his first win in his last 10 rankings events, it was Aidan who started the more brightly with his 3rd visit been a nice break of 105. Wayne still not at the races and very scrappy tried to get back into the game and with a break of 64 before a bad cover at the top of the table got him to within 19 points of Aidan, Aidan continued to score consistently when at the table and reclaimed his advantage till the time was called Well done to Aidan on a very good win. And thanks to everyone who entered.
Our next event is the 22nd of February in Newbridge cyms, also good to remember all juniors are free to enter with plenty of free coaching from experienced players also available there is also a lot of chances to represent Ireland in multiple international events on the billiards circuit each season.
