Good morning. Monday's roundup starts in Bolton, where the IPA's amateur season came down to the very last ball, then hops to southern Brazil for a tour card settled in a decider, before snooker's invitational week gets going in Leicester and the pool circuit packs its bags for Vietnam.
BLACKBALL: HARJEET SINGH SURVIVES THE HARD WAY IN BOLTON
Harjeet Singh is the IPA 2026 Amateur Series Grand Final champion, and he will not have many nerves left this morning.
The Royal Sports Lounge event drew a 110-player field playing double elimination into single elimination, races to eight on the winners' side. Singh did not take the easy road. He lost 8–6 to Wade Morley in the second round on Saturday and had to dig back through the losers' bracket on Sunday morning, beating Jack Evans 6–2 and Dawud Qadir 6–2 to get back into the knockout draw.
From there it was pure brinkmanship:
- Last 16: beat Enrico Forgione 8–5
- Quarter-final: beat Jack Park 8–7
- Semi-final: beat Jonathan Bushnell 8–7
- Final: beat Josh Thomond 8–7
Three hill-hill finishes on the bounce, the last of them late on Sunday night. Thomond deserves real credit too. He beat harvey cunnah 8–6 in the quarters and edged Scott Mackenzie 8–7 in his own semi to reach the final.
Full brackets and frame scores are on CueScore.
SNOOKER: MOREIRA TAKES THE PAN AMERICAN TOUR CARD IN A DECIDER
Noel Rodrigues Moreira is heading to the World Snooker Tour. He beat Daniel Holoyda 5–4 in the Pan American Open final at Mampituba Country Club in Criciúma, Brazil, and that wins him a two-year tour card covering 2027/28 and 2028/29.
It was a final that swung all evening. Moreira nicked the opener 48–46, Holoyda won the next two, and the pair traded frames until it was 4–4. Moreira took the decider.
- Semi-finals: Moreira beat Claudio Menechini 4–3, Holoyda beat Jason Williams 4–1
- Quarter-finals: Moreira beat Rayan Menechini 3–0, Holoyda beat Hiago Lima Mendes 3–0
Results per snooker.org.
SNOOKER: CHAMPION OF CHAMPIONS STARTS TODAY
The Champion of Champions gets under way at the Mattioli Arena in Leicester this afternoon, and local man Mark Selby opens his title defence in front of a home crowd.
Today (Group One):
- Mark Selby v Alfie Burden, best of seven, from 1pm UK time
- Barry Hawkins v Chris Wakelin, best of seven, follows on
- The two winners meet in the best-of-11 group final from 7pm
Rest of the week:
- Tuesday: Neil Robertson v Panchaya Channoi, Judd Trump v Jak Jones
- Wednesday: Shaun Murphy v Ronnie O'Sullivan, Wu Yize v Chang Bingyu
- Thursday: Zhao Xintong v Thepchaiya Un-Nooh, Kyren Wilson v Ali Carter
- Semi-finals Friday and Saturday at 7pm, best-of-19 final on Sunday
The one to circle is Tuesday. Channoi, the 18-year-old reigning World Women's Champion from Thailand, makes her debut at the event against Robertson. Kyren Wilson arrives on Thursday fresh from his Nanjing win over John Higgins.
The winner collects £150,000 from a £440,000 prize fund. Where to watch: live on ITV in the UK.
POOL: WORLD NINEBALL TOUR HEADS TO HO CHI MINH CITY
The Universal Open Ho Chi Minh breaks off on Wednesday (11 to 15 November) at Sniper Billiards Club. It's a World Nineball Tour Silver event with 128 players and a $63,000 prize fund.
- Format: double elimination down to the last 64, then single elimination, with the final a race to 13
- Featured names: Aloysius Yapp, Carlo Biado, Johann Chua, Robbie Capito, Olivér Szolnoki, Mickey Krause, Wu Kun Lin, Bernie Regalario, James Aranas, Jeffrey Ignacio and Anton Raga
- Next stop: the Universal Open Bangkok follows straight after, so it's two ranking titles in back-to-back weeks for the travelling pack
Expect a big Filipino presence and a home Vietnamese crowd that knows exactly what it is watching.
INDIA: ADVANI LEADS 22-STRONG SQUAD INTO HOME IBSF WORLDS
The IBSF World Snooker Championships start on Thursday at the Yeshwant Club in Indore and run until 21 November. Three-time champion Pankaj Advani and reigning women's champion Anupama Ramachandran lead India's 22-player squad, which has 15 men and seven women.
Advani, Hussain Khan, Brijesh Damani, Manan Chandra, Aditya Mehta, Ketan Chawla, Sourav Kothari and Malkeet Singh go straight into Stage 2. Former world 6-red champions Laxman Rawat and Kamal Chawla are among those who have to come through Stage 1. It's the last of three major events the Billiards and Snooker Federation of India is staging for its centenary, per PTI.
ON THE RADAR THIS WEEK
- Champion of Champions, Leicester, today to Sunday (ITV)
- Universal Open Ho Chi Minh, 9-ball, Wednesday to Sunday
- IBSF World Snooker Championships, Indore, from Thursday
Big week. Back at lunchtime with the first results from Leicester.
Reggie Rutherford, Cue Ball Talk
Feature image: “Cue ball in focus with out-of-focus pool rack” by Candeadly, via Wikimedia Commons, licensed CC BY 4.0.
