The 2021-2022 World Professional Snooker Tour has already concluded two ranking tournaments and qualifiers for the Northern Ireland Open, but one person has not yet appeared in any competition, that is, Neil Robertson, who is now the world's fourth-ranked "Melbourne Machine".
Among the top players, Robertson has always been a model player who is not inferior to Selby, but so far this season he has not been able to appear on the field, because he has been preparing for his wedding, just before, he and his fiancée Miller, who has been in love for more than ten years, officially held a belated wedding for the two, if not affected by the epidemic, the two should have become a "legal couple" earlier. At present, Robertson has a son and a daughter with Miller and lives a happy life.
In a recent interview, Robertson talked about his views on the current World Snooker Championships and made it clear that the World Championships need to be changed, the schedule should be shortened, and even consider changing the venue of the competition that has not been moved for more than forty years, the Crucible Theatre.
As we all know, the World Championships is the most important event of the year for snooker, there is no one, and the format design is also a unique long, the semi-final grab 17, the final grab 18, the game usually spans two days, 3-4 stages. Robertson won the World Championship once in 2010, but his best result in years has been only once in the semi-finals. He believes that most fans are not interested in sticking with a long game.
"I have a little problem with the World Championships, which is its length, personally, I don't really like this kind of 'marathon' race, I think it's outdated. The four-stage final is a process of going in and out for the audience, and it is difficult for them to see the entire 35-inning duel, so they may prefer to watch the final of the British Championship or the Masters.
The first three rounds of the World Championship were 10 and 13, and Robertson thought that this length was enough to test who was the better one in the game, and could stop there, there was no need to grab 17 or 18 innings. "Personally, as a sports fan, I don't want to watch that long and I feel like unless we change it, we're going to lose a lot of potential fans of the sport."
Robertson also said that the British Championship has previously significantly reduced the length of the final (in 1993, the British Championship final was shortened from the previous grab 16 to grab 10 and has been used to this day), and the players are the beneficiaries of it, no longer have to worry about the game is too long, just think about the wonderful performance for the fans.
Robertson has won a total of nine titles over the past three seasons, and he is the other top player in these years besides Trump, Selby and O'Sullivan, but he has stopped in the quarterfinals of the World Championship for three consecutive years. He believes that if the format can be adjusted, he has the strength to achieve more, but the current World Championship is too long. "I know that in the 33rd or 35th innings, I can't keep my concentration from start to finish, it's my problem, I need to change myself, but if it can get shorter, I'm certainly more happy to see it."
In addition to the length of the event, Robertson also talked about the playing field. The World Snooker Championships have been held at the Crucible Theatre since 1977, and Robertson said: "It's certainly a great place, one of the best venues to play." But I still don't like the design of the two tables side by side in the field before the semi-finals, which will make the field appear more crowded, which is not a good thing for the players. If I could, I wouldn't mind seeing somewhere else before the semi-finals where the tournament could be held, and then the semi-finals, the finals, would come back here. ”