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【Recommendation】Polar Night Shimmer - When resigning the old and welcoming the new, it is time to worry about Ding Junhui again!

【Recommendation】Polar Night Shimmer - When resigning the old and welcoming the new, it is time to worry about Ding Junhui again!

The author of this issue is "Dead as Autumn Leaves". With Yan Bingtao losing to Williams in the quarterfinals, Chinese fans still have to wait another year for the world championship. But this time, the voice of "China's snooker still has to see Ding Junhui" will be much smaller, because yan Bingtao and Zhao Xintong's performance at the World Championships has been enough to make people believe that they are and will be the mainstay of China snooker for a long time; in contrast, Ding Junhui's overall performance in both the season and the world championships are much inferior, and his sense of existence is slowly weakening. This article would be helpful if anyone else was willing to care about his current situation and his prospects for next season while ignoring, sarcastic and abusive.

【Recommendation】Polar Night Shimmer - When resigning the old and welcoming the new, it is time to worry about Ding Junhui again!

On the one hand, the situation is extremely bad, on the other hand, this bad situation will continue like the polar night for a long time, and there is no end in sight.

Ding Junhui's win rate has been as low as 60.98% this season, the lowest since the snooker tournament flattened in 2013, and the ranking prize money of 63,000 pounds is also lower than last season, making it the record since the 2014 world ranking switched to a prize money ranking. In terms of achievements, the situation has deteriorated to an unprecedented level. In terms of rankings, Ding Junhui's single-season ranking ranked 31st, the lowest since the 2009/2010 season. At the end of the season, Ding Junhui's world ranking was fixed at 32nd, just holding the top 32, also the lowest in history since the 2005/2006 season.

According to Ding Junhui's current schedule, he will miss the ranking version of the Champions League and the European Masters after the start of the new season, and will deduct the prize money of the European Masters eight two years ago, so it is almost inevitable that he will fall 32 at the beginning of next season. This is not necessarily a bad thing from the point of view of the draw (which is not discussed here), but we can find that compared with the previous two brief drops out of the top 16, this time there is almost no end to the fall out of the top sixteen.

Even if he reaches the final or even wins the championship in the small competition, he is still too far away from the top sixteen. Therefore, next season's Masters qualification and the British Championship/World Championship seedings no longer need to be taken into account, because if he can get any of these three qualifications, it means that one or even several decisive victories have already occurred, and these three qualifications will no longer be important compared to them. Fighting for the main stage of the three major competitions is likely to become the norm in the future, and falling out of 32, stopping the qualifiers... Maybe it will follow.

【Recommendation】Polar Night Shimmer - When resigning the old and welcoming the new, it is time to worry about Ding Junhui again!

However, with an overwhelmingly bleak outlook, there are still three positive results for this season that deserve attention.

The first is to reach the final four of the ranking tournament after a gap of 27 months. The significance of this breakthrough need not be said, it rekindled the fans and even Ding Junhui himself to win the championship hopes. Although the Turkish Masters O'Sullivan, Selby and Robertson did not participate, his performance in the competition is undoubtedly commendable.

Then there was another victory over the top sixteen after a gap of 15 months. If you want to win the heavyweight championship, defeating the top sixteen is the only way. Therefore, the 5-3 victory over the world's fifth-place Wilson game has also greatly improved Ding Junhui's confidence.

Finally, I would like to focus on the analysis, that is, to break the hundred. On the surface, this season's 32-shot break is only decent, and it is only in the middle of the career. However, if you look at the data on the percentage breaking rate, you will find that this season is the highest percentage breaking rate since Ding Junhui turned professional, and the percentage breaking rate is as high as 12.36%. Especially since the New Year, it has been as high as 14.35%. Although the high rate of breaking the hundred is gratifying, compared with the previous few hundred percent increases, this time it is very strange. In 2016 and 2019, the significant increase in breaking 100 was accompanied by the outbreak of achievements, and the highest percentage breaking rate of this career was accompanied by one of the worst results of the career, which is enough to explain the problem.

It is true that in the period of breaking the hundreds, there are not many opportunities left for Ding Junhui, in addition to the just-concluded World Championships, the ranking tournament only has three stops of the Turkish Masters, the Welsh Open, and the Gibraltar Open, and in addition to the Welsh Round of 32 lost to O'Sullivan, the remaining two games he reached the final four and the quarterfinals respectively, compared to the previous performance has been unsatisfactory. However, beyond the objective reasons, we still have a very reasonable perspective to explain all this, that is, confrontation training, or rather, chaotic ability. Next, I will further analyze it in conjunction with Ding Junhui's post-world championship interview after the first round.

【Recommendation】Polar Night Shimmer - When resigning the old and welcoming the new, it is time to worry about Ding Junhui again!

For the lack of confrontation training, Ding Junhui never hides it. After the first two games of the season were extremely bad, he mentioned the matter on Weibo. In a post-match interview in the first round of the World Championships, he also said that "sometimes I practice with the children of the academy, but not a lot." Lack of confrontation training, in the game is manifested as chaos is difficult to win. For example, in the first round of the World Championships, it lost 8-10 in the case of multiple data higher than opponents, which is enough to explain the problem. This also explains why the career-high percentage breaker achieved the worst result of his career, because in addition to the continuous attack, he lacked other means to win the next set.

In addition to confrontation training, participating in more competitions can also improve the ability of high-intensity confrontation. In the first round of post-match interviews, Ding Junhui also mentioned the frequent participation in the competition, he believes that the current frequency of the game is too high, either in the game or on the way to the game. In my opinion, not participating in small competitions is the crux of the current problem.

"Billiards don't make a fuss" believes that Ding Junhui needs to find his status through the game, which I agree with. Taking this season as an example, after last year's World Championships, he took a six-month vacation, during which he practiced very little, and there was almost no practice. Therefore, in this state, it is natural to enter the professional football world that has warmed up fully through the ranking version of the Champions League and two major ranking matches. This in turn led to the inability to participate in the World Grand Prix, the Players' Championship, and the opportunity to participate was further reduced. Therefore, in the full queue between the Masters and the World Championships, Ding Junhui really participated in only two sets of Champions Leagues and three ranking matches.

The frequency of matches is one aspect, and the attitude towards competition is another. Ding Junhui said very realistically in the interview, playing a game is like completing a task, the World Championships are still like this, and the small game is even more lacking in interest. He also admitted that his interest in small games in previous years was very low, but in the past two years, he has improved a bit. In another interview, he said: "I fight back and forth, now in addition to these three competitions (three major competitions) the prize money is too small, (prize arrangement) in the middle of the gap is too large, take a championship to enter the top sixteen top eight", is the truth, but also shows that he does not have any expectations for small games, anyway, play badly, as long as you do not take the championship prize money is almost the same.

【Recommendation】Polar Night Shimmer - When resigning the old and welcoming the new, it is time to worry about Ding Junhui again!

In terms of playing style, he also did not shy away from it: "I am now playing more inclined to attack, the rhythm of playing is biased towards faster, biased towards attacking, I don't like to grind with people, there is no meaning, I will enter, if I don't enter, you will go up and play anyway." "This is even more obvious in small games, playing with this style of play, for some low-ranking players can naturally win easily, but at the same time reduce their chances of practicing defense and chaos." This is the old point of British celebrities, has he lost his love of the sport? However, this problem is obviously not just a cause, but a mutual cause and effect with his achievements. The British Championships two and a half years ago failed to put him in a virtuous circle, so I am afraid that the occasional good results are not enough, and it is still a long way to go to regain his love and get back on track.

All in all, in this season when everything has fallen to the lowest point, we can still see a little flash, especially the highest breaking percentage of the career. We may not be able to explain what this statistic means, but it at least shows us and himself what he wants to be sure of the most: his basic set , the level of the ball is still there. The recovery of self-confidence, the return of love, and the improvement of level are far from being counted, but far from being expected.

Of course, if he just treats playing as a job, then his ability is more than enough, although in the middle of the season he needed to seriously consider next year's relegation, but in the end he completed the relegation task ahead of schedule through the final four of the Turkish Masters and the top 32 of the World Championship. I fully believe that if he only aimed at relegation, he could play for many years, and I can fully accept this ending. But for most Chinese fans, if this is the case, the career of Ding Junhui in their hearts is in fact over.

Finally, I attached a short video produced by the BBC during this year's World Championships, which interviewed some of the world champions after losing the world championship final, and some of the content reminded me of Ding Junhui more than once. You may remember that after Ding Junhui lost the first round, O'Sullivan's evaluation of him as a "businessman" (businessman). This assessment may be biased, and I personally don't fully agree with it, but it points to at least one aspect – in O'Sullivan's view, Ding Junhui is at least not a pure sportsman, and the spirit of love for sports is exactly what is emphasized in the short film. Of course, if you succeed or lose, you can critically absorb the views in it, and perhaps different people can read different gains from it.

Host Kurosawa Evan said at the end of the short film: "I really think that a champion is not defined by his victory, but by how he turns things around and makes a comeback when he falls", hoping that Ding Junhui can eventually become such a great champion. Maybe this process will take a long time, Selby took 7 years to reach the final and win the championship again after losing his first world championship, and next year Ding Junhui is just 7 years away from the first world championship final, so it is not yet a time of complete despair. Of course, everything is based on action rather than publicity, which is my consistent view, so let's continue to look forward to Ding Junhui's performance next season.

Today in history

On May 10, 2018, Ding Junhui was inducted into the Snooker Hall of Fame, becoming the first Chinese player to receive this honor.

—— This section is provided by the outstanding "Dead as Autumn Leaves" teacher

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