GARY WILSON will use a different cue this week as he swaps 22 balls for ten.
The North East potter is a very self-critical individual and he says he has had a “dreadful” time on the snooker table this season.
Gary Wilson is set to try a different sport after a struggling seasonGetty
Not only is he out of the running for the money-spinning Players Championship and Tour Championship in Telford and Manchester respectively.
But he is not set to be a seed for the 2025 World Championship in Sheffield, which means he has to go through two rounds of qualifying.
The gap in his calendar means he can fly to Bosnia for the six-day European Open Pool Championship – which starts on Tuesday – and take on the elite in a different discipline.
The 39-year-old plays unseeded Kuwaiti Abdullah Alqattan on Wednesday.
Wilson, 39, told SunSport: “I never play pool. Only whenever a tournament comes around, I might get a game in beforehand.
“It does mess with the snooker. It’s two different sports. It’s like a table tennis player playing tennis.
“You can’t really play the two of them at the same time. Not if you want to compete at the top level of either.
“It might be a hobby that I dip into. The only way I’ll reverse that – and play more pool – is if I’m even more dreadful than I already am at the moment and slip down the rankings.
CASINO SPECIAL – BEST CASINO BONUSES FROM £10 DEPOSITS
“Or if I cannot make any money from snooker.
“That would be the only point I retire from snooker and might dip into a bit of pool.
“Any form of pool is more frustrating than snooker in some ways. Because there’s a lot of luck involved.
“Everybody can play to an extent. It’s generally an easier game to play than snooker.
“Everybody on the Nineball Tour is very friendly. It’s a different atmosphere to snooker.
“The odd character in pool might think, ‘here’s a snooker player coming in, thinking snooker is much harder than pool, we’ll show him it’s just as hard’.
“That’s the furthest from the truth – snooker players don’t think that at all. We know how difficult it is to play at the top level of the game.
“I have the utmost respect for the guys at the top of any of the pool disciplines.”
It is not unusual for snooker stars to make the switch and appear in both sports.
Ronnie O’Sullivan, the seven-time world snooker champion, played in two Mosconi Cups, the sport’s version of the Ryder Cup, but he was on the losing side for Europe against the United States.
Jimmy White and Alex Higgins once wore European team colours and Steve Davis was involved in 11 competitions between 1994-2004, winning titles twice in 1995 and 2002.
Asked if a leading snooker player could ever win a NineBall event given the standard at present, Wilson replied: “It’s achievable if you have a massive dose of luck in these tournaments.
“There’s an outside chance that if I get a bit of a run going, have a bit of luck, I can go really deep in a pool event.
“It’s not beyond the realms that a snooker player could put a bit of work in and still compete.
“You do have to put some practice in, know about the equipment a bit more thoroughly, practice for more than a day or two before a competition.”
Creator – [#item_custom_dc:creator]
