Great to see Mark Selby back on top to win his record 4th China Open title!
https://www.wst.tv/news/2026/august/16/Selby-Too-Strong-For-Saengkham-In-China-Final/
I don't know who exactly is responsible for naming trophies (WST, or tournament organizers, or maybe in this case the CBSA?) but this practice has become more common recently and I think it would be a fitting tribute.
The first season of Breaking Bad introduced the idea that despite his tough-seeming, stereotypical drug-dealer exterior, Krazy-8 was just a guy, Domingo, with his own history and personality.
Better Call Saul obviously tried to follow up and elaborate on this, introducing Domingo as like this shy guy that barely seems like he belongs in this business. They tried to build him up, slowly give him more confidence, more swagger, alongside with giving us the backstory of his name and his status as a CI. But they stopped short of the full transformation, at the last point we see him, being interrogated by Hank, he still mostly seems like this soft, inoffensive guy with maybe a tad more self-confidence, but nowhere near the level of aggression and penchant for violence that's portrayed in BB. We never get to see him get to the point of that confidence and bad-assery that he has in the pilot of BB.
Sure, you can say that this character development happened in the empty space between BCS and BB while he was in jail, and that's obviously canonically what must have happened, but it's just an anticlimactic story arc. Why tease us with the development and background of this character if you're not actually going to show it to us?
He's in one scene over the whole of season 2, just walks into the trauma room, is mildly rude but obviously competent, assesses the situation in about 5 seconds and leaves. I just wonder, what's the point of his character?
Is it just a bit of comic relief? Is his character a comment on stereotypes about orthopedic surgeons that I'm not aware of? It just feels like you wouldn't cast a whole actor like Lou Ferrigno Jr. for this one scene if you didn't have bigger plans for his character. It's a bit odd to me. He's also never mentioned or talked about prior to or after that scene (afair).
I recently watched Many Saints for the first time, I dragged my feet a bit on it since I heard the community wasn't enthusiastic about it. One of the bits of fan service they included in that movie—of which there were altogether too many in my opinion—was the "origin story" of Silvio's hair. In the beginning of the movie, we see him with a thinning hairline and a combover, and after the 4-year time jump, he has the iconic massive hair that is unambiguously revealed to be a hairpiece when it gets shifted at one point.
This was a bit of a surprise to me. I know Silvio's hair is ridiculous in the show, it doesn't really fit his face, especially as Van Zandt ages, and it never changes one bit over the course of the show, in contrast to other guys who we see with graying and/or receding hairlines over time. Every fan knows it's a hairpiece and most casual viewers would hopefully pick up on it as well.
But still, it's never addressed (in contrast to Ralphie's toupée) and I even thought Silvio's final appearance in the series finale in the hospital confirmed that it was meant to be understood as natural hair; his hair there looks disheveled and natural, and if it was a hairpiece, wouldn't Gabriella or a nurse just take it off when he's in a coma in the hospital?
In my opinion, Silvio was easily the worst element in Many Saints, John Magaro somehow managing to out-ham Van Zandt and firmly dragging the character into cartoonish surreality, something which Van Zandt, despite everything, always managed to just keep teetering on the edge. But the backstory of his hair was just weird and continuity-breaking to me. It just felt like Chase was lampshading something that had become a bit of a joke in the community but that he initially never intended to be one.
What, you're telling me ya never pondered that?
In the ongoing Championship League tournament in the match between Kyren Wilson and Haydon Pinhey, the following situation occurred and I think the referee made a mistake.
EDIT: relevant video starting at timestamp where Emery makes the initial foul and miss here
So Pinhey missed the reds and John Pellew, the referee, called foul and a miss. Pinhey didn't move any balls besides the cue ball so Pellew went about replacing the cue ball in the baulk area. This period is called a consultation period, as per Section 2 (Definitions) Rule 22 of the Rulebook:
>22. Consultation period
A consultation period is the period in which players may assist the referee with replacing any ball(s) to the original position prior to when an infringement was committed (Section 3 Rules 2(c)(ii), 3(k), 10(i), 14, and 16) or as described in Section 3 Rule 9 and 15. The consultation period starts from the moment the decision is made to replace the ball(s) and ends when both players are satisfied as to the position of the ball(s), or by the referee’s final decision.
So far so normal. Then, Pinhey, possibly working out the shot he wanted to play, and while Pellew was still replacing the balls, accidentally touched and moved one of the reds with his cue. At that point, John Pellew called "foul" and awarded Kyren Wilson 7 points. I think that's where Pellew made the first slight mistake, since according to Section 3 (The Game) Rule 11(f) of the Rulebook:
>11. Penalty Values
(...)
The following acts are penalties and incur four penalty points unless higher penalty points are indicated in paragraphs (e) to (g) below.
(...)
(f) Seven points if any player contacts, with any part of their person, attire or equipment, any ball on the playing area during a consultation period.
Now the important word here is penalty. According to the rules, penalties are strictly different from fouls, cf Section 2 Rule 15:
>15. Infringements, Fouls and Penalties
An infringement is any violation of these Rules.
A foul is an infringement which will end the offender’s turn.
Penalties are infringements which do not affect the order of play.
So John Pellew should have called "penalty" not "foul". Section 3 Rule 11 explicitly differentiates between acts that are fouls (outlined in paragraphs (a) through (d)) and those that are penalties (paragraphs (e) through (g)).
This matters because what happens next is, Kyren Wilson engages in conversation with the ref, it's unclear exactly what they're talking about, but he's clearly asking about the infringement that just occurered and, importantly, if John Pellew either preceded to replace the white ball (and possibly the red ball that Emery moved) or left the table as it was after Pinhey's infringement, there would a a free ball on, if indeed, Kyren Wilson had been fouled, cf. Section 3 Rule 12:
>12. Snookered After a Foul
After a foul, if the cue-ball is snookered (see Section 2 Rule 17), the referee shall call FREE BALL.
(...)
But I would contest that Wilson wasn't fouled. Emery committed a penalty. As such, the order of play should not have been affected, Pinhey should still have been the one to play on next, Pellew should have just replaced the relevant balls and on it should have gone and no free ball could have possibly been called since that only applies in the case of fouls.
But Pellew awarded the free ball which essentially led to Emery losing the frame and match.
EDIT2: After more thought, I think Pellew was right after all. He should have called "penalty" instead of "foul" but otherwise, the free ball was obviously awarded because of the foul and miss from Pinhey previously.
Thoughts?
Spoilers for the complete series and Many Saints!
I was getting annoyed that there were no good actually complete family trees online, from what I could find. There were only partial trees for some of the families but their interconnection was sometimes hard to grasp from those. So I went a bit insane and made this tree using familyecho.com. A few caveats and assumptions:
This year's edition of the annual World Women's Championship is underway in Dongguan in China, where it has been held for the last three years.
May 12th to 15th will see the group stages completed, where women from all over the world battle it out in groups of 5 over quickfire best-of-five matches. Then it is on to the knockout stages with increasing match lengths which will culminate with the best-of-11 final on May 19th.
Can Bai Yulu hold on to her two-year reigning crown as world champion or will she finally be dethroned?
The event will also include the World Women's Under-21 Championship, currently defended by Thailand's Panchaya Channoi, as well as the World Women's Seniors Championship where legend of the sport Tessa Davidson will try to hold on to her crown.
The whole event features a combined minimum prize fund of £42,000 with £13,000 on offer for the winner of the main championship.
You can follow all the action on the WPBSA YouTube channel.
After just one day's rest of play, snooker is back at the Crucible Theatre in the form of this year's iteration of the World Seniors Championship.
After a compact between World Snooker Tour and World Seniors Snooker expired, there is no restriction anymore for players ranked inside the top 64 on the main professional tour to compete in World Seniors events, and so the field is bigger this year than ever before with standout participants like Ali Carter and Ronnie O'Sullivan.
The first round, last 16 and quarter-finals will be played as the best-of-7 frames, before best-of-13 semi-finals and a best-of-19 final match.
The matches will be broadcast in the UK on 5 as well as on Pluto TV where international viewers from the USA, Canada, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Brazil, Mexico, Austria, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Australia can also follow the action.
