Mark Williams' approach to snooker was notoriously relaxed, with only two defeats in his entire career that he remembers to this day, and of course there were other things on the Tour that kept the Welshman unhappy.
文/Phil Haigh，《Metro》
Williams, a 46-year-old three-time world champion who won the British Open earlier this season, has seen his ranking total to 24. Williams will make another appearance in this week's "Champions-in-a-Crown" invitational, where he hopes to win the tournament after his victory over COVID-19 and gout.
Due to a positive COVID-19 test, Williams withdrew from the England Open and European Masters qualifiers. Williams, who is gradually recovering from covid-19 symptoms, is facing the threat of gout.
Williams said in an interview: "I'm getting better now and my sense of taste is slowly recovering. I lay in bed for five or six days, my whole body shaking. ”
"God bless me for getting better in Tuesday's game against Neil Robertson. If the game had been scheduled for last week, I would have been completely out of the game. ”
"I think gout is coming again!" I started taking gout-fighting medicine again. Usually, you have gout, your feet hurt so much that you can't walk, and you take medicine for two or three days. I just felt my ankle start hurting again, so I started taking my medication early, just in case. ”
"They said to eat healthier, but I had been eating a vegetarian diet for two or three weeks before I got sick, so it was weird. I'm now eating meat again. They say don't drink too much, but I don't drink that much now. I don't want to drink it anymore because alcohol can really kill people. ”
The illness and pain that struck Williams at the height of the tournament was undoubtedly very irritating. Williams said: "I won a championship last year and this year I took one, and I played very well. I've always been unlucky, getting gout and COVID-19 when I was just playing better. ”
"Even with gout, I was still just one goal away from beating John Higgins 4-0. I should have won the race and reached the quarter-finals in Belfast, and then what will happen who knows? ”
"I missed two events due to COVID-19. I just had some good momentum then, and now I have to start from scratch and get it back. It's really speechless. ”
Williams always said that losing didn't affect him in the slightest, and even taking a 3-0 lead over old rival Higgins in Belfast and then losing the game 3-4 didn't make him flustered.
"Honestly, I lost a simple red ball or I would have won 4-0. Another set of red and black balls is enough, which would have been easy. In the end I lost and shook hands with him. ”
"I don't know why people don't believe me, the result of the game doesn't affect me in the slightest. The narrator said 'Oh, he'll be sad for a while'. Sad what's wrong? How can it be sad? For God's sake, you just lost a snooker game, man. ”
Since turning pro in 1992, Williams seemed unable to imagine his own experience of getting angry about failure, and when asked in time, he recalled one or two examples of being "very annoyed."
"The only thing that I remember vividly is that I lost to Ali Carter at the British Championships, which I remember at Telford (quarter-finals in 2008). It was 8:8, and I could have won 9:8 with just one red ball, but I lost that red ball. ”
"It was the only race I remember driving back after the game and I didn't speak to my friend Matthew along the way. I was very embarrassed to drive home. ”
"The next morning, I was still angry. It was the only game I remember in 30 years that I was very annoyed about. ”
"Maybe there's one or two more, but I don't remember. Wait, I remembered the match against Paul Davidson, when the score was 4:4, last season's German Masters qualifiers. ”
"He didn't hit the yellow ball, I sat behind him and saw it clearly. I told the referee he had fouled, and the referee asked me, 'How are you sure?' ’。 I was sitting in the back. I asked them if they could re-examine and they said no. I was a little annoyed by that, but only because it was funny. ”
"He probably came over a few weeks later and apologized to me that it was a foul, but he didn't see that arc ball or anything at the time. But for me, it took him a long time to explain the matter. If he said it directly after the game, I would have told him it was okay. Losing makes no difference to me, but it took so long for him to explain, and it wasn't obvious that he saw it but didn't say it. ”
"I can't refute it because if the referee doesn't see it, it certainly won't end up awarding a penalty. But it's still a rare occurrence, and in three decades of my career, there haven't been many games that have upset me as much as that. ”
Asked if that was due to years of veteran experience or his personality, Williams said, "I've always had that attitude. ”
"When I'm playing, no one will work harder than I do. But as soon as the game is over, I will shake hands and make peace, and the result of the game will be what it is. ”
Although Williams is very casual about the game, he still hopes to see some changes on the tour, such as reducing the number of professional players on the tour and providing some bonuses for first-round losers.
Now there are some amateur players who can make up for the game, and if they lose the first round of the game, they can't get a point of prize money, but they have to post their own money to participate. Williams wanted a small tour event that could be held consecutively.
He said: "I'm afraid I'm going to talk about the substitution players. If you're ranked high at Q School, you can compete in two of the best competitions at the same time. You can participate in every professional ranking tournament, every amateur tournament, and if you are over 40 years old, you can also participate in all the Seniors Tournament. How can this be fair? ”
"I think it might be better that way, if you need to make up players to play, then make up according to the Q School rankings, but only once. You can't let the top-ranked players have the opportunity to make up for every game and weed out the professional players who do it. In my opinion, if they don't get a professional qualification through Q School, they shouldn't compete professionally. For now, it makes more sense that they have and can only compete in one competition. That's just my opinion, but I think the current system is unfair. ”
"Surely more than half of the players on the Tour are struggling to live on a shoestring. You have to have a chance to score a few rounds after the game to earn more bonuses, but not many players can do that. Usually it's those familiar faces every time, so it's very difficult to earn a bonus. ”
"Anyway, you've never had all 128 professionals sign up in a tournament, so I'd suggest cutting the number of professionals on the Tour. I hope that players who can stay in the profession after being streamlined can get some guaranteed bonuses after losing the first round. ”
"Qualifying professionally is supposed to be a supreme honor, and once you join the Tour, your life should be guaranteed. You don't have to worry about losing money and not making money. This will make it more difficult for amateur players to switch careers, and after streamlining, all professional players can have a decent life. ”
Even with as many as 128 professional players on the current tour, Williams doesn't understand why even a little revision of the first round bonus can't be made.
"For example, if the prize money in the first round of the British Championship is 6500 pounds, the prize money for the promoter is changed to 5000 pounds, and the loser gets 1500 pounds, what is wrong with that? I prefer this way. It can put a lot of pressure on young people who rank lower. ”
"I don't understand why they don't do it, it seems easy. The prize money in the first round of the World Championships is around £10,000, so what's the harm in dividing £10,000 into three or seven or two or eight splits for both the winning and losing sides, depending on whether you qualify or not? I think there must be a reason, otherwise they would have done it a long time ago. ”
"I don't understand how this can be a reward for the loser? It's just about helping them pay their bills to make ends meet. But I do think the Tour participants are too voluminous, when was the last time we didn't have a replacement player in the ranking game? ”
In recent years, Williams himself has made some changes, and what he did not expect was the way he changed the way the game was kicked off. When he kicks off, he will choose to flick a library of mother balls to the bottom of the red ball pile, rather than the traditional way of the mother ball hitting the corner of the red ball pile and returning to the top bank.
At first, there were calls to ban this conservative way of kicking off, and even WST sent group emails to players asking if it should be allowed. Some players saw the benefits of this kick-off and replicated it, much to Williams' delight.
Williams said: "If this way of kicking off is really banned, it will definitely make me laugh, which is actually very sad. I didn't do anything wrong. ”
"John Higgins did it after me, Ronnie O'Sullivan did it, and more than a dozen other players did it. If everyone did this, it would not leave the opponent with a chance to attack the long platform. ”
"I don't kick off much like this now, but if you can't hide the mother ball behind the green ball, I'll hit the mother ball back into the red ball pile." It was just a mediocre kick-off. ”
"As if anyone really has an opinion? I kicked off the ball like that, and others disagreed unless they said it in front of me. I don't remember who it was, but I beat him 4:0. If my tee is going to annoy people, I'd be more likely to do it. The more people talk about prohibition or not, the more I have to do it. ”
"You can't forbid Ronnie from playing the scatter heap. But they tried to ban my tee- and I never received an email from WST asking if it was forbidden to play the scatter pile, and I felt that the WST must have no problem with what Ronnie did. ”
Williams was of course open to changes in the game, supporting Judd Trump's call for modernising the game's dress and endorsing the possibility of hosting the World Championships outside Crucible.
Williams said: "I always felt that sooner or later the World Championships would be moved from Crucible, and the next venue would be better than Crucible. ”
"I understand why people always think that tradition is the best, it's limited to certain situations that can't be generalized. But I think the World Championships are just a bigger event, and if you spread it out, like the Football World Cup, you can make more money. ”
"If the World Championships are really moved, Crucible will be able to host other competitions as well. A table of Crucible can be the most worthy place to play. ”
Regarding snooker's dress code, Williams said he would be happy to make changes to attract the younger generation. However, he also admitted that changing the dress code is not something that can be done by the players alone.
"I read what Judd said and I think he makes a lot of sense. Listen, my career is nearing the end, so whether you're playing in a T-shirt, casual or shorts, it doesn't make any difference to me, and I don't care. But he said it makes sense to want to involve young people. ”
"The young players don't want to see Judd Trump play in cookie-cutter clothes, they'd rather see Judd in his own clothes or whatever. I guess it shows your personality. We have to quickly attract young people in, and I'm a little apprehensive about the uneven quality of amateur competitions I'm seeing. ”
"There were some kids playing in my club, but it was so much worse than when I was a kid. I was at the Welsh Junior Championship and you could see a huge number of contestants. I've heard that there are only five or six participants in the current junior championship, which is worrying. But it's hard to attract people to snooker clubs but they're either playing video games or playing football outside. ”
"I don't think the one-time T-shirt looks bad, it's a very interesting change. I don't think everyone will accept the change, but if I could, I might come out in a tracksuit. ”