There will be a golden ball in the upcoming Riyadh Season World Masters of Snooker event in Saudi Arabia. If players like Ronnie O’Sullivan pot it after earning a 147 break, they might win £400,000.
Twelve of the biggest names in the sport will compete for an £800,000 prize fund during the event, which begins on Monday and ends on Wednesday.
Although the golden ball, which is worth 20 points, was revealed in January, more information has only been available in the days preceding the competition.
According to the World Snooker Tour, every frame will begin with the gold ball level with the brown area on the baulk cushion.
The referee will remove the gold ball from the table after the 147 maximum break is no longer achievable. The ball will stay in play at that time.
There will be no formal recognition of the new ball as a 23rd ball since the rule book does not recognize it.
For the 12 players competing this week in Saudi Arabia, including 2019 winner Judd Trump and defending Crucible champion Luca Brecel, there is, nevertheless, a significant money potential.
One of the players engaged, Ali Carter, reportedly said, “The gold ball? It’s simply unimportant.
“I mean, it would be a miracle if someone made a 167.” However, Ronnie O’Sullivan is more than capable of doing it. We’ll watch and wait.
O’Sullivan declared this month that he would go ‘on strike’ from 147 breaks unless snooker chiefs increased the prize money.
The Sun claims that
When questioned about how many more 147-score breaks he could possibly record in the sport, O’Sullivan replied, “I reckon another five or six, but I went on strike a long time ago.” He also recommended that snooker authorities “start bumping up the prize money.”
The maximum break prize money in the World Snooker Championship last year was £40,000.
The idea of adding extra balls to a snooker game is not new. An orange ball worth eight points and a purple ball worth ten were added to the 1959 Snooker Plus Tournament, which was held at Burroughes Hall in London and was supported by the News of the World.
A maximum break of 210 was permitted by the additional balls, which were placed from the beginning of the frame with the orange ball between the pink and blue and the purple ball between the blue and brown.
