Bradford Sport
Melling's luck runs out in World Pool semi-finals
10:00am Thursday 23rd February 2012
Keighley’s Chris Melling is still the only player ever to have been a professional at English pool, American pool and snooker at the same time.
And the 33-year-old knows only too well how much Lady Luck can play a part when it comes to success at eight-ball pool.
Melling, a key member of Europe’s Mosconi Cup triumph over the United States in Las Vegas in December, must have trodden on a black cat before his semi-final of the World Eight-Ball Championship in the United Arab Emirates.
He had the better statistics in all aspects of the American version of the sport, apart from the key one of the break in losing 9-7 to Chang Jun Lin in the semi-finals at the Fujairah Tennis and Country Club on the east coast.
“I didn’t sink a ball in five breaks and I missed two shots and he missed five but he won,” said a frustrated Melling.
“Generally speaking if you break off and don’t sink a ball then you lose 80 per cent of those frames."
The Keighley cueman has undoubtedly been one of the world’s best pool players over the past 18 months and oozes confidence every time he comes to the table but was almost surprised when playing home favourite Salah Al-Rimawi in the last 32.
The No 1 player from the United Arab Emirates was 8-6 down before levelling and had the break off in the last frame.
However, Al-Rimawi came up dry from that next shot and Melling cleared the table to sneak through 9-8.
“I thought he might have felt the pressure, playing on TV in front of a home crowd,” said Melling, “but he played well.”
Equilibrium restored, Melling then defeated Thorsten Hohmann 9-4 in the last 16 and the last Filipino Roberto Gomez by the same score in the quarter-finals.
Melling went 2-0 up against Chinese Taipei’s No 1 Chang in the semi-finals but the Far Eastern star, who has a deliberate style of play, took a 4-3 lead and never looked back.
With the Yorkshireman consistently failing to sink anything from the break, Chang led 6-3, Melling winning the next two before Chang once again went three up at 8-5.
The Magician pulled the match back to 8-7, only for eventual tournament champion Chang to hold his nerve in the 16th frame, leaving Melling clutching a cheque for $7,500.
Chang won $20,000 and his compatriot Fu Che We $15,000 as runner-up.
Melling then cast his mind back two months to the Mosconi Cup and confessed: “It is different when you are playing for Europe in a team competition compared to an individual event.
“But I certainly learnt one or two things from my team-mates and it has helped me to cope with pressure in individual events.
“It has also raised my profile. I have reached my limit on friends on Facebook and have got one or two sponsorship deals on the back of my increased profile, including one from Keighley’s Kevin McGrann.”
This weekend Melling is playing at Daventry, Northamptonshire in a Great Britain Nine-Ball Tour event, which starts tomorrow and finishes on Sunday.