David Taylor (snooker player)

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David Taylor
birthday July 29, 1943
nationality EnglandEngland England
Nickname (s) The Silver Fox
professional 1969/70, 1971-1997
Prize money £ 216,130
Highest break 125
Century Breaks 15th
Main tour successes
World championships -
Ranking tournament victories -
Minor tournament victories -
World rankings
Highest WRL place 7 (1981/82)

David Taylor (born July 29, 1943 ) is an English snooker player from Cheshire . From 1969 he took part in the professional tour for a total of 27 years and played when he was over 50. Since he grayed early, he was known by the nickname The Silver Fox (German: Silberfuchs ).

Career

The beginnings and the 1970s

When he was just 14 years old, David Taylor began playing snooker at the Chorlton Billiard Hall in Manchester. At the end of the 1950s there was still gas lighting there . He made a living as a hairdresser and in other professions, and played as an amateur for a long time. In 1968 he became English national champion and then took part - as the only European - in the amateur world championships in Sydney , Australia . He won his preliminary group unbeaten and with victories over the two Australians Paddy Morgan and Max Williams he won the world title. He then decided to do snooker professionally. However, there was no organized snooker operation at the time and the snooker world championship was decided in challenge games. Together with Rex Williams and other professional players , he founded the world association WBSA , of which he was a board member for 21 years. From 1969 they organized the professional world championship again as a tournament with a main round, initially with 8, later with more players. In 1970 and 1972 Taylor himself was one of the top 8 players, but from 1973 he was eliminated in the last 16 at the latest. When in 1976 a tournament seed list of the best players from the results of the last three world championships was created for the first time, he took 16th place there.

In 1977 the UK Championship was introduced as the third major tournament after the World Championship and Masters , but at that time it was exclusively for British players. In the second year the Englishman reached the final of a professional tournament for the first time in his career after victories over John Virgo and Alex Higgins . He lost to the Welshman Doug Mountjoy with 9:15. He also played in the 1978/79 season for the first time at the Masters and reached the quarter-finals. At the 1980 World Cup , he survived the quarterfinals for the first time in the tournament with a 13:11 win over Ray Reardon before losing to Cliff Thorburn in the semifinals . In the 1980/81 season he reached a final at the Yamaha Organs Trophy in Derby for the second time. Steve Davis won against him 9-6. At the 1981 World Cup he reached the quarter-finals. This moved him to the top 8 in the world and took his best place in the world rankings with 7th place . When Davis played the first official maximum break in snooker history in front of cameras the following year , Taylor was a guest commentator for the BBC .

The 1980s and 1990s and the end of your career

Quarter-finals or round of 16 was often his result in professional tournaments in the following years. For the 1982/83 season the ranking was changed to a two-year rating and for the first time two more tournaments were used for rating. At the first of these, the International Open , Taylor reached his third professional final and his only ranked final. He lost again this time, Tony Knowles got the upper hand with 9: 6. He had previously won the tournament against Steve Davis and John Virgo. In the following year he did not surpass the round of 16 in any tournament. He started the 1984/85 season with a semi-final and a quarter-finals at invitation tournaments in New Zealand and Australia. He also achieved his best result in the quarter-finals of the English professional championship . In the ranking tournaments, however, he did not reach more than the round of 16. He reached the Round of 16 in 1985 for the 13th and final time in his career. The following year he reached the last sixteen at the UK Championship and after being eliminated in the first Crucible round at the World Championship , he dropped out of the top 16 in the world rankings at the age of 42.

Despite his relatively old age, he was able to keep up with the professional tournaments in the following years. In 1987 he reached the quarter-finals of a world ranking tournament at the British Open again. This and the next year he reached the main round of the World Championship in the Crucible and in some tournaments the round of the last 16. A weaker season 1987/88 without a round of 16 was followed by a better year with round of 16 at two ranking tournaments, the International Open and the Classic . He even won a smaller WPBSA professional tournament 9-1 against Steve Meakin . The tournament took place at the same time as the World Matchplay , an invitation tournament for the top 12 in the world. In another small tournament he reached the semi-finals in 1989. Due to the lack of higher results in the ranking tournaments, he fell out of the top 32 in 1990 and out of the top 64 in 1991. In the 1990/91 season he had not reached the round of 32 once.

In the early 1990s, Taylor bought a property in Little Bollington, a village near his home in Cheshire . There he set up the Ash Farm Country Guest House , a 4-star guesthouse that he ran with his wife.

From 1991 the professional tournaments were open to all players, so that he didn't have to worry about his professional status and could continue to play snooker at a high level. In 1991/92, despite a constant performance, he again did not reach the round of the last 32. And in the next few years it was difficult for him even to reach the last 64. In 1994 he reached this round again at the Thailand Open . At that time he was already 50 years old and defeated, among others, the 45-year-old Alex Higgins . Most recently he only won a few matches and fell out of the top 128 in 1996. He continued to play until the end of the 1996/97 season . Then the professional tour was split up and he should have qualified to continue playing the big tournaments. In the second rate UK tour he did not appear.

Nevertheless, he continued to play snooker and took part in the English amateur championship, where he reached the quarter-finals of the northern group in 2000. Around 2010 he also played in the Professional World Championship and the World Seniors Championship , but did not get beyond the pre-qualification. He made his last appearance at the age of 68 at the 2011 World Seniors Championship .

successes

Ranking tournaments:

Other professional tournaments:

Amateur tournaments:

swell

  1. ↑ a b c Profile of David Taylor (snooker player) on CueTracker (as of 2018)
  2. ↑ a b Jordan Rowbottom: Local Snooker Legend. View Timperley Issue 4 (on issuu.com), July 27, 2010, accessed February 7, 2018 .
  3. ↑ Jamie Jackson: Back to the 80s when we were all snooker loopy. The Guardian, May 3, 2009; accessed February 7, 2018 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Taylor, David
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English snooker player
DATE OF BIRTH July 29, 1943