Kurt Maflin

Kurt Maflin
birthday	8th August 1983 (age 37)
nationality	Norway
professional	2001/02, 2003/04, 2007/08, 2010–
Prize money	£ 536,403 (as of August 30, 2020)
Highest break	147 (2 ×)
Century Breaks	181 (as of August 30, 2020)
Main tour successes
World championships	-
Ranking tournament victories	-
Minor tournament victories	-
World rankings
Highest WRL place	31 (January – February 2015)
Current WRL location	27 (as of August 17, 2020)
Best results
Ranked tournaments	Semi-finals (3 ×)

Kurt Maflin (born August 8, 1983 in London ) is a Norwegian snooker player .

Career

Youth, years as an amateur and first professional years

Kurt Maflin started playing snooker when he was seven or eight years old. By the age of ten he was training almost every day. In the 2001/02 season , the native of England made it to the Snooker Main Tour after good results at amateur tournaments . He was the second youngest professional player in the world at the time. After just one season, however, he dropped out of the world rankings again and in 2003 he moved to Norway with partner Anita Rizuti , who is also successful in snooker, and settled in Oslo.

With that he put snooker on hold and gave up his professional ambitions. It was only when he found a sponsor in 2006 that he started intensively again with the sport and fought his way back to the Main Tour with first place at the Pontin's International Open Series . In 2006 he also won the IBSF Amateur World Championship . The following year he narrowly missed qualifying for the Masters , he lost the final against Barry Hawkins 4-6. A little later he again missed the qualification to stay on the professional tour, but then managed to return in 2010 with his victory at the EBSA European Play-Offs .

2010/11 and 2011/12 season

In the very first tournament of the Players Tour Championship (PTC), which was held for the first time in the 2010/11 season , he achieved the 71st official maximum break in snooker history in the first round . His greatest success at a professional tournament was in March 2011 when he reached the round of 32 at the China Open . His world ranking position was not enough to stay on the Main Tour. Maflin was able to secure a place among the professionals immediately after the season at the third Q-School event with a victory over Martin O'Donnell .

The best result of the following season was the round of 16 at the PTC tournament in Fürstenfeldbruck , he reached round 3 three times in the small tournaments. At the Shanghai Masters and the Welsh Open he was among the last 48. Although he rose to 74th place in the world rankings but that wasn't enough to stay on the tour.

2012/13 season

It was only thanks to the PTC Order of Merit that he remained a professional in the 2012/13 season . At the Wuxi Classic he came back under the last 48 at the beginning of the next season before he made it to the quarter-finals for the first time at the Gdynia Open 2012 . At another PTC tournament, the Scottish Open 2012 , he scored the second official maximum break of his career and the knockout point. At the first tournament in 2013, the Munich Open , he defeated the former world champion Neil Robertson 4: 3 in a dramatic match after he was already 3-0 down. After another victory in the round of 16 over Liam Highfield, he lost to Rod Lawler 3: 4 in his second quarter-finals . This also secured him participation in the PTC Grand Finals . After victories over Ken Doherty , Rod Lawler and Ben Woollaston , he reached the semifinals of a world rankings tournament for the first time, in which he lost 4-0 to Ding Junhui . Before that, he had made it into the last eight for the first time in the special shoot-out format, which did not count towards the world rankings. At the German Masters 2013 he made it to the round of 16. Finally, he survived at the end of the season at the World Cup for the first time a main qualifying round against Craig Steadman . Then he defeated Steve Davis 10: 7 and only a narrow 8:10 defeat to Peter Ebdon prevented the entry into the final round at the Crucible Theater . He finished the 2012/13 season as number 64 in the world rankings and thus automatically stayed on the Main Tour for the first time.

2013/14 and 2014/15 season

The following year he usually started with one or two wins per tournament, the first better result being the round of 16 at the International Championship after defeating Mark Williams . Then he came in two PTC tournaments, the Kay Suzanne Memorial Cup and the Antwerp Open in the last 16. At the shoot-out Ryan Day stopped him in the quarter-finals. With two more round of 16 in world ranking tournaments, he continued his rise in the rankings. At the German Masters 2014 he succeeded in beating world number two , Mark Selby , at the World Open he defeated Allister Carter and Joe Perry, among others . With two opening wins at the China Open and the World Championship , he came within two places of the top 32 at the end of the season. In the 2014/15 snooker season , apart from one round of 16 at the Yixing Open, there were initially no successes. Individual wins brought additional points, which meanwhile brought him to 31st place. He also reached the last sixteen at the Lisbon Open . But after a series of defeats at the beginning, he fell back significantly before the last two tournaments of the season. At the China Open he made it to the semi-finals for the second time in his career after winning, among others, over Ali Carter and Shaun Murphy . Mark Selby then prevented his entry into the finals. Then he continued his success at the World Cup . He won against Steve Davis in his last regular professional season with 10: 1 and fought against Fergal O'Brien in a match that ended 71:61 in the deciding frame, for the first time in the World Cup finals. On his first appearance at the Crucible, he met Mark Selby again. After 4: 8 deficit he started a race to catch up and was 9: 8 only one frame before the victory. But defending champion Selby could win the next two frames and thus the match. In the final accounts of the season, the Norwegian was back in 37th place.

2015/16 season

The 2015/16 season was mixed again and he only reached the round of 32 three times. It only went better at the German Masters , where he reached the last sixteen after defeating Marco Fu . Reaching the third round at the World Cup , where Robert Milkins prevented his second Crucible entry, saved him 50th place in the world rankings. The following year went better. At the World Open he reached his first well-paid round of 16. In three other tournaments he came back under the last 32 before the second round of 16 followed at the Northern Ireland Open . At the Welsh Open , he achieved his third-best career result with the quarter-finals. As a result, he worked his way up to 38th place, but the early retirement at the China Open and the World Cup ruined that so that at the end of the season he stagnated at 52nd place in the ranking.

Season 2016/17

The 2016/17 season started again mixed. At the Riga Masters 2016 and the Indian Open 2016 he failed in the qualification. It wasn't until the World Masters that things went much better: After beating David John 5-1 in qualifying, Maflin defeated Michael White ( 5-4 ) and Xiao Guodong (5-0). He failed in the second round to Shaun Murphy , who defeated him 1: 5. He also made a century at the World Open.

At the Shanghai Masters, Maflin also performed well. In qualifying he defeated Yan Bingtao 5: 4, Rod Lawler 5: 0 and Mark Davis 5: 4. In the first main round he then lost 5-1 to Allister Carter .

After the two successes there was another worse time. At the European Masters Maflin failed after a 4-1 victory over Jason Weston in the second qualifying round to Michael Holt . The English defeated Maflin 4-0. In the English Open in 2016 Maflin was defeated in the first round Ryan Day 1: 4, the International Championship , it ran for Maflin but again better: In the qualifying round, he defeated Sanderson Lam with 6: 4 in the first round then Matthew Selt 6 : 2. Maflin failed in the second round 4-6 to Ronnie O'Sullivan .

Maflin was also above average at the Northern Ireland Open 2016 . In the first three rounds he defeated Zhang Yong 4-2, Alex Borg and Josh Boileau 4-1 each. Maflin failed in the second round to Mark King , who defeated him 2-4. At the 2016 UK Championship , Maflin lost 6-2 to Ryan Day in the second round after Maflin defeated Allan Taylor 6-0 in the first round . Maflin also failed at the Scottish Open in the second round, this time to Daniel Wells with 1: 4. In the first round he had defeated Sam Craigie 4-1.

At the German Masters , Maflin failed in the first qualifying round 3: 5 to Joe Perry . At the Welsh Open, however, Maflin was again on the best side. He defeated Fang Xiongman 4-1, James Wattana 4-3 , Mitchell Mann 4-2 and Yan Bingtao 4-1. Maflin only failed in the quarterfinals to Robert Milkins with 2: 5. During the 5 games Maflin was able to do 2 Century's. At the snooker shoot-out Maflin lost 26:47 to Darryl Hill in the first round.

At the China Open 2017 Maflin won his qualifying game against Adam Duffy 5-1, but then lost in the first round 3: 5 to Ben Woollaston . This negative trend continued at the 2017 World Snooker Championship when Sydney Wilson defeated Kurt Maflin 6:10 in the first qualifying round. Maflin ended the year ranking position 52nd

Season 2017/18

The 2017/18 season started well for Kurt Maflin. At the Riga Masters 2017 he surprisingly won his qualifying game 4-3 against Martin Gould . Also in the first main round Maflin remained victorious with a 4: 3 win over Alan McManus , but then lost in the following round with 2: 4 against Jimmy White . At the World Cup 2017 he competed for Norway together with Christopher Watts and finished last in Group A, level on points with Finland. At the China Championship , Maflin won his qualifying game 5: 3 against Thor Chuan Leong , and his first round match 5: 0 against Michael Georgiou . His winning streak ended in the second main round with a 2-5 defeat by Fergal O'Brien. The same thing was repeated at the Indian Open 2017 : He won his qualifying game against James Wattana with 4: 2, his first round game with 4: 2 against Zhou Yuelong and failed again in the second round with 3: 4 against David Gilbert .

After a good start to the season, Maflin lost his qualifying game at the 2017 World Open against Welsh player Duane Jones . Muflin also lost his qualifying game 2: 4 against Mark King at the European Masters . At the English Open 2017 Muflin lost his first game, this time 2: 4 against Thepchaiya Un-Nooh .

At the International Championship things went a little better for Maflin. He won his qualifier 6-2 against Joe Swail , but then lost his first round game just 5-6 against Ryan Day. When Shanghai Masters 2017 , it was again better: He defeated in the qualification Peter Lines with 5: 4 and then moved by victories over Lee Walker (5: 4), Yu Delu (5: 3) and Mei Xiwen (5: 2) to to the quarterfinals, where he lost to Jack Lisowski 3-5 . During the tournament he played 3 breaks with over 100 points, including a 135 break.

Maflin also recorded high breaks at the Northern Ireland Open 2017 , including: a. a 140 break. He defeated the better seeded Andrew Higginson and failed with 2: 4 at the later semi-finalist Elliot Slessor . At the UK Championship 2018 , Maflin was able to advance through victories over Alexander Ursenbacher and Jimmy White to the third round, where he failed 3: 6 to Joe Perry . At the Scottish Open 2017 he recorded a heavy 4-0 defeat against Mei Xiwen , and at the German Masters 2018 he also lost 4-5 in the first qualifying round, this time against Josh Boileau . This series of defeats continued at the snooker shoot-out 2018 when he failed with Jak Jones at 17:27 on points . After all, he was able to record whitewash against Jimmy Robertson at the Welsh Open 2018 before he lost 4-1 to Sam Craigie .

At the Gibraltar Open 2018 he benefited from Stephen Maguire's waiver , but lost 4-0 to 1997 world champion Ken Doherty in the following round . At the penultimate tournament of the season, the China Open 2018 , he lost in the decider against Yan Bingtao .

The qualification for the Snooker World Championship 2018 ended for him in the 2nd round when Chris Wakelin defeated him 10: 4.

Web links

Commons : Kurt Maflin  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Den norske snookerstjernen - Kurt Maflin (Interview, Norwegian)
• Profile at World Snooker (English)
• Kurt Maflin in the snooker Database (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Profile of Kurt Maflin on CueTracker (as of December 22, 2017)
2. ↑ World Rankings. (PDF; 261 kB) After The Xuzhou Open 2015 (AT3). (No longer available online.) World Professional Billiards & Snooker Association , Jan. 27, 2015, archived from the original on July 13, 2015 ; accessed on July 13, 2015 . 
3. ↑ Kurt Maflin ( memento of November 17, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) at Oslo Snooker, accessed on September 3, 2017
4. ↑ Maflin Scores Maximum In Ravenscraig ( English ) In: worldsnooker.com . World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association . December 14, 2012. Archived from the original on September 4, 2017. Retrieved on December 15, 2012.
5. ↑ worldsnooker.com: Arcaden Munich Open, 3rd January 2013 ( Memento from 4th March 2016 in the Internet Archive )