Again, it took a while for me to write another part of my "focus on small snooker-countries"-series. This time I'll focus on Australia.
Wait what? Australia? small? Well... you might argue, that Neil Robertson was world champion and world number one, and I cant prove you wrong. But... besides him...? See, thats the reason I includeded Australia, but I'll leave out Robertson, as he is famous enough to inform about him elsewhere, just like I did with Marco Fu and Hong Kong here.
Australia
When we take a look deep into history, the first famous Australian name you'll find is Horace Lindrum. He was a finalist in the world championships three times (1936, 1937 and 1946) but lost all of them against the unbeaten champion Joe Davis. You have to keep in mind, that the World championship wasnt anything like today, as it had just a few participants and snooker was not really a competitive sport like today.
When in 1952 the Billiards Association and Control Council and the Players Association made two different World championships, Lindrum won the BA&CC-version (as one of only two participants), so he is even included in some lists of world champions, although the legitimacy of this event as a world championship is disputed.
It is said, that he made more than 1000 centuries in public events, although records from this era shouldnt be viewed too credulously.
After him, Eddie Charlton was the next Australian to reach a final of a world championship. When the WCs were played in challange-events (comparable to chess or boxing) he challanged John Pulman, but lost 39:34.
He made it into two more WC finals in 1973 and 1975 (in Melbourne!), when the event was already played as a tournament, but before it went to Sheffield. He lost both matches to welshman Ray Reardon. In 1972, 1973 and 1980 he won the Pot Black Cup, the World Matchplay 1976 and he was a world championship finalist in English Billards too.
Another one who made it to a world championship final is Warren Simpson. He played in 1971 in Sydney against John Spencer, but lost 37:29. I couldnt find out much more about him, except that wikipedia says he died in 1980 suffering from diabetes.
Warren King is a notable player, who reached the final of the Classic in 1990 and qualified for the world championship four times. (career high rank: 35)
Glen Wilkinson is another veteran player, who played at the professional circut at the begin of the 90s. He meanwhile returned to Australia and won a couple of national and continental championships.
Well, we slowly come closer to present, and our next player is Quinten Hann, who was a pretty successful player, reaching the halffinals in the Irish Masters 2004 and being a top-16-player for two season. Moreover he earned more than 400k pound in his professional career. Unfortunately he always was kind of an enfant terrible. He was brought to court for raping but was acquitted. After losing a game to Andy Hicks he challanged him for a boxing fight. Mark King accepted on Hicks' place and both got proper boxing licences. Hann won.
His star finally sunk, when he was accused of betting manipulation in 2005 by journalists of the gutter paper "The Sun". Hann finally recieved an eight year ban from professional snooker in 2006.
Johl Younger played two years on the main tour (2002/03 and 2003/04) making it to the Last 64 in the World Championships as well as the British Open as his best career results.
Another player of format is Steve Mifsud, who won the IBSF amateur championship 2002. He was a main tour player in 2003/04 and 2007/08 but wasnt very successful. The probably best known player he was able to beat was Liang Wenbo, before his breakthrough. He played as Robertsons double partner at the 2011 World Cup and gained a wildcard for the Australian Goldfield Masters Event 2011, just like his brother James Mifsud (both lost their opening matches though).
Since 2006 Vinnie Calabrese regulary plays at the main-tour-qualification events (PIOS/Q-School) and maybe we'll see him as the second Australian main tour player soon.
Thanks for reading and plug in for the next episode - I'll take New Zealand and Brazil in Part six.
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