The World Seniors Snooker Championship has been branded "a disgrace" after defending champion Alfie Burden was forced to play his opening match on a practice table. The over-40s tournament was thrown into chaos on Thursday when one of the two match tables at the Crucible was deemed unplayable following complaints from several players.
As a result, the match between Matthew Stevens and Dominic Dale, which had started, had to be paused. Stevens had earlier looked on in disbelief after both the cue ball and a red jump bounced during an attempted pot. They eventually resumed on the other table but only after the conclusion of the match between Ali Carter and Roger Farebrother. That saw the match between Burden and Igor Figueiredo - the last two winners of the tournament - moved backstage to a practice table.
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The Brazilian swept to a 4-0 whitewash, meaning Burden didn't get to defend his title in front of a Crucible crowd. The situation led to criticism on social media.
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Lee Stephens, a former runner-up in the amateur WSF Championship, was particularly scathing. He said: "This is absolutely disgraceful! World Seniors should be ashamed of themselves!
"I'm not surprised, however. They make bad decision after bad decision! [The] defending champion out the back, not getting the walk on and the intro [like] that! P*** poor!"
World Seniors Snooker boss Jason Francis told the Express: "I've written to Igor and Alfie and apologised that we were unable to provide a table for them to play on. It was obvious that there was a major joint and slate drop on table two, which meant it was unplayable.
Francis added: "The tables get relevelled every day. Anyone who knows the Crucible knows it hasn't got a solid floor. There's a void underneath, so it's a challenge everyone has. We're not the first people to have a problem with a table at the Crucible.
"But that doesn't take away any of the responsibility we have. We feel disappointed that we were unable to complete all the matches on table two, meaning Alfie and Igor had to play in the practice room.
"We do the best we can. You can't mitigate for everything. We are experienced promoters and the team have put in a tremendous effort overnight. We learn and will try to do better. And again, we apologise to Alfie, Igor, Matthew and Dominic."