Morning. Makati is quiet for a few more hours, so we're starting a long way south: the women's tour lands in Sydney this weekend with the biggest field it has ever had there. Then it's back to the Reyes Cup, a quick Belfast note, a weekend winner from North Carolina, and the diary.
Australian Women's Open — record field, and Reanne is back
The second event of the 2026/27 World Women's Snooker Tour starts on Saturday at Mounties in Mount Pritchard, Sydney. Per the WWS preview published overnight, 29 players have entered, the biggest draw since the event became a world ranking tournament in 2018 (27 made the trip two years ago). Six of the world's top ten are there.
- Reanne Evans plays in Sydney for the first time since 2018, when she reached the semis. The 12-time world champion has made the final of both the World and UK Championships since May, and opens in Group B against Joey Tohme plus three tour debutants.
- Ng On-yee is the event's most successful player in the ranking era: champion in 2018 and 2023, runner-up in 2019 and 2024. She's going for a third title of the year after winning the Belgian and British Opens.
- Mink Nutcharut, also a two-time Sydney winner, hasn't won on the WWS Tour since January 2025. One more ranking title would put her into double figures, a club only seven players have joined.
- Anupama Ramachandran makes her Sydney debut as Group D top seed after beating world champion Panchaya Channoi from 0–2 down in Leeds last month. Australian No.1 Jessica Woods is in her group.
- Narucha Phoemphul, last year's runner-up, and So Man Yan, who has reached the knockout rounds of her last 12 events, head Groups E and F.
Six round-robin groups over Saturday and Sunday, then the top two in each plus the four best third-placed players go into the knockouts on Monday and Tuesday. There are Seniors (12 entries, up by half on 2025, Carlie Tait defending) and Under-21 side events too. Play starts at 10am Sydney time on Saturday, which is the small hours of Saturday morning in the UK. Results are on WPBSA SnookerScores.
Reyes Cup — night two, and Asia need the AJs to wake up
It's 2–2 at Makati Coliseum after Thursday, and the overnight reading in Manila was not kind to the home side's youngsters. Spin.ph pinned the nightcap squarely on last year's MVP: AJ Manas hung the 6 in the opening rack, missed the 4 in the second, scratched after potting the 8 in rack five and missed a bank on the 2 in the next, and the Americans made him pay.
Absolute Pool's day-one takeaways went the other way on Van Boening. They had him with the most missed pots for the Rest of the World in the team match, and named Francisco Sánchez Ruiz their early MVP frontrunner after his 5–1 singles win over Duong Quoc Hoang. They also defended Francisco Bustamante's call to pair the two teenagers on night one: bank a point from Biado and Capito, back Duong in the singles, and hope Manas and Januarta ride the crowd. Two out of three came off.
Friday has five matches: a team match, then singles, doubles, singles, doubles. Under the format, every player has to feature at least once in matches seven to nine, so nobody can be hidden. Break-off is 7pm in Manila, which is noon UK time. It's live on WNT TV, on ESPN+ in the US and on One Sports in the Philippines. First to 11 takes it.
Belfast — one absentee, and one last ticket
The Northern Ireland Open starts on Sunday at the Waterfront Hall. SnookerHQ's preview notes that Ding Junhui is the only big name missing from the draw, a surprising call given he's likely to drop out of the top 16 in the coming weeks. It also points out that Belfast is the last chance to earn a Champion of Champions invitation. Cork's Aaron Hill, who opens against Thepchaiya Un-Nooh on Sunday afternoon, has backed the Waterfront as a possible World Championship venue in an interview with The Irish News. The winner gets £100,000. Matches are best of seven up to the last 16, best of 11 for the quarters and semis, and the final is best of 17.
USA — Sias goes unbeaten in Clemmons
On the regional scene, AZBilliards reports that Joao Sias went through the Jersey Girl Billiards Breaktime Battle 3 Split Bracket undefeated last weekend at Breaktime Billiards in Clemmons, North Carolina. The event drew 71 players across the high and low brackets. Sias was giving up games on the wire almost all the way through, and he still beat Robert Cuneo 9–2 in the Final Four hot-seat match, then Matt Bulfin by the same score in the final. That makes 2026 his best recorded earnings year. Robert Wilkerson won the Friday warm-up, Ann McElveen took the Ladies event, and Jas Makhani and Lucas Courtney split the Second Chance.
Q Tour Americas — dates are in
The WPBSA has confirmed two Q Tour Americas stops for 2026/27, run by PABSA. The first is at The Corner Bank in Toronto on 22–24 January, and the second is at the PABSA Academy in Santa Clara, California, on 5–7 February. A record 92 players took part last season, and the best performers again go through to the Global Play-Offs, where three World Snooker Tour cards are up for grabs.
Your weekend
- Today: Reyes Cup day two, Makati, from noon UK time (WNT TV / ESPN+ / One Sports).
- Saturday: Australian Women's Open groups begin at Mounties, Sydney. The English Open and World Billiards Championship also get going at Landywood Snooker Club, Great Wyrley, with David Causier defending.
- Sunday: Northern Ireland Open, Waterfront Hall (TNT Sports / HBO Max). The LPBA qualifying round opens at KINTEX in Goyang. Reyes Cup finale in Makati.
- Next week: EPBF European Championships for seniors and ladies in Gandia from Monday, the WPA Blackball World Championships at the Thistle Heathrow from Tuesday (scores on CueScore), and the Philippines Open at Gateway Mall, Quezon City, from Tuesday.
Feature image: Ng On-yee at the World Championship qualifiers in Sheffield, April 2026. “Ng On yee Sheffield 2026” by BennyOnTheLoose, via Wikimedia Commons, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
