2018 World Championship

[blahblah01]

Watching the coverage on YouTube, it's interesting that they are doing a sort of golf style coverage, jumping from table to table. What does everyone think of it? I think it works reasonably well for the early rounds, though it sucks if you want to watch a specific match.

Sign up to Betfred or Betfair, and you can watch one of four, with no commentary B)

McManus has a chance to go 3-3, but looks really grumpy....

Had....

[PatBlock]

I wonder if Alan McManus has been practicing with Stephen Maguire. :wink:

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[PatBlock]

Definitely, and yet the announcers make it seem that there are general trends that apply to everybody. The other issue is that these are all professionals and the best in the world. The vast majority of players who tighten up or feel a lot of pressure are weeded out and aren't even on tour.

When a player misses a shot in a key moment, announcers want to always attribute it to some psychological reason. The reality is that players miss shots in random patterns and sometimes it's at a key moment and sometimes it isn't. Sometimes a shot is missed because the pockets are small and the game is hard and not because the player succumbed to pressure.

Yes the do tend to generalise, one of the reasons I tend to avoid them these days.

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[Stony152]

Isn't that simply because we're all different, so any beneficial effect of having a lead is going to vary from person to person, depending on their own individual psychological makeup?

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Definitely, and yet the announcers make it seem that there are general trends that apply to everybody. The other issue is that these are all professionals and the best in the world. The vast majority of players who tighten up or feel a lot of pressure are weeded out and aren't even on tour.

When a player misses a shot in a key moment, announcers want to always attribute it to some psychological reason. The reality is that players miss shots in random patterns and sometimes it's at a key moment and sometimes it isn't. Sometimes a shot is missed because the pockets are small and the game is hard and not because the player succumbed to pressure.

[Csmith]

Watching the coverage on YouTube, it's interesting that they are doing a sort of golf style coverage, jumping from table to table. What does everyone think of it? I think it works reasonably well for the early rounds, though it sucks if you want to watch a specific match.

[PatBlock]

Maybe I exaggerated slightly when I said it was a complete myth, but the concepts of being "hot" or a "clutch" player is really difficult to quantify. Announcers (especially ex-players)really believe in having or not having momentum in terms of how you feel when you are playing well or poorly. The problem is that the stats often don't back it up.

Isn't that simply because we're all different, so any beneficial effect of having a lead is going to vary from person to person, depending on their own individual psychological makeup?

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[Stony152]

We’re actually doing reasonably well. Four of us are above the cut off point of somebody just randomly picking the highest ranked player. I'll post the final result on Wednesday night.

Stony152 (11) - Day, Xiao, Dott, Milkins, Lyu, Liang, Lisowski, Perry, Thepchaiya, Robertson, Maguire
Odrl (10) - Day, Xiao, Dott, Holt, Liang, Lisowski, Walden, Perry, White, Maguire
JimMalone (10) – Day, Xiao, Dott, Milkins, Lyu, Liang, McManus, Perry, Robertson, Maguire
Mr Snooker (10) - Day, Xiao, Holt, Lyu, Stevens, Liang, Lisowski, Walden, Robertson, Maguire
jw147 (8) - Ebdon, Highfield, Xiao, Zhang, Milkins, McLeod, McManus, Wakelin

I think I missed Burden, so jw147 is actually at (9). Some of his picks of lesser players like McLeod, Wakelin, and Burden are looking pretty good.

[Stony152]

what studies are these? do u have a link?

There is a lot of discussion on this topic on the internet. Just google "momentum in sports" The first major study was in 1985, where Thomas Gilovich studied the "hot hand" theory in the NBA. He found that there was no evidence of a having a hot hand or momentum. As an example, if a player has made five shots in a row, the odds of him making the next shot were in line with his overall odds of makingthe shot. The same for a player who has missed five shots in a row. There was no way to predict when hot streaks started or when they would end. Recent studies have found errors in his methodology and it's a bit of a controversial topic.

Maybe I exaggerated slightly when I said it was a complete myth, but the concepts of being "hot" or a "clutch" player is really difficult to quantify. Announcers (especially ex-players)really believe in having or not having momentum in terms of how you feel when you are playing well or poorly. The problem is that the stats often don't back it up.

Like I mentioned, Gilbert wins four frames in a row to get to 9-8. Shouldn't he be confident and feeling less pressure at that point? If so, why did he then lose the next two frames. It's a difficult concept, and not nearly as straight forward as announcers would have you beleve.

[Mr Snooker]

How on earth can they not show Stevens vs Doherty?

That is what I thought to a former world champion and also reached the final on two occasions plus a twice finalist as well playing each other, and they also played each other in the 2000 Masters final in Which Ken Doherty missed the black for the 147. Matthew leads the first session 7-2, I thought this would have been a closer match, let's hope Ken can pull it back in the second session I predicted a 10-9 win for either player on this match

[Stony152]

How on earth can they not show Stevens vs Doherty?

Aren't they jumping around from table to table like last year?

[armstm]

what studies are these? do u have a link?

I prefer watching with commentary. In the US they did an experiment a number of years ago in the NFL. They broadcast a game with no announcers. The vast majority of people hated it and it's never been tried since.

I like Hendry. He can be complementary or critical, depending on what's required. And it's interesting to hear him talk about strategy, because he's obviously been there and done that.

I pretty much hate all of the Eurosport announcers. Especially Dave Hendon and Joe Johnson. Hallett is annoying. I don't mind McManus. The biggest problem is all of the psychological garbage they talk about. "he's under more pressure", "he has the momentum" ,etc.

Momentum in sport is mostly a myth. Look at last night. Gilbert was down 8-5 and won four frames in a row to go up 9-8. At that point he had all of the momentum. Then he went on to lose 10-9. Studies have repeatedly shown that there is something there, but it's mostly a myth.

If you went back through snooker history and looked at all of the matches were a player was two up with three to play and then the match went to a decider. I can guarantee you (assuming a large enough sample size) that the winner of the two frames to get to the decider has won the decider 50% (+/-3%) of the time.

[kligu]

How on earth can they not show Stevens vs Doherty?

[Stony152]

Some of our predictions for who will reach the crucible aren't looking that good. On average 85% of the higher seeds win first round qualifying matches and 70% win second round matches. So 0.85*0.7 = 0.6. So theoretically the highest ranked player in each group of eight has a 60% chance of reaching judgement day. 16*0.6 = 9.6. So if you picked each favourite based on ranking you'd expect to have 9 or 10 players left going into tomorrow. Any more than that would be considered a good result. We'll check how everybody is doing tonight.

We’re actually doing reasonably well. Four of us are above the cut off point of somebody just randomly picking the highest ranked player. I'll post the final result on Wednesday night.

Stony152 (11) - Day, Xiao, Dott, Milkins, Lyu, Liang, Lisowski, Perry, Thepchaiya, Robertson, Maguire
Odrl (10) - Day, Xiao, Dott, Holt, Liang, Lisowski, Walden, Perry, White, Maguire
JimMalone (10) – Day, Xiao, Dott, Milkins, Lyu, Liang, McManus, Perry, Robertson, Maguire
Mr Snooker (10) - Day, Xiao, Holt, Lyu, Stevens, Liang, Lisowski, Walden, Robertson, Maguire
jw147 (8) - Ebdon, Highfield, Xiao, Zhang, Milkins, McLeod, McManus, Wakelin

[jw147]

TBH, I'm sick of them all, I'd much rather have the unadulterated atmosphere, which the eurosport player usually provides, thamkfully.

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Need to bring the great WT back, but they sacked him because mcgill was gone!

[jw147]

ROS hopes Holt can convert his 8-4 lead against Slessor...

Is there any that chance I'll be able to stream Lisowski's second session?

ROS would beat slessor 10-0 at the crucible. If he got 3 frames id be shellshocked.