He hails from Wexford

-
Rodney Goggins is an accomplished snooker player from Wexford in the Republic of Ireland. Goggins shot to fame after winning the International Billiards and Snooker Federation World Under-21 Championship in 1999 at the age of 21, beating Rolf de Jong 11-4 in the final in Egypt. After two quarter final finishes in qualifying events in the 2003/4 season, Rodney made it onto the main tour for  2004/5. His best performance in that season was a last 64 place in the 2005 Irish Masters but wasn’t enough to keep him on the tour after finishing a disappointing 90th.

Having finished first in the Irish rankings for 2006/7, Goggins regained his place on the main tour in 2007, reaching the last 64 of the UK Championship. The following year was a a duplicate of the previous and with no further improvements, Rodney lost his place again after losing to Gerard Greene 3-9. Ranked 70th, a career best, Rodney fell off the tour as only the top 64 players retained their places.

Good fortune visited Rodney again in 2018 when he reached the final of the Irish Amateur Championships and finished a runner to Michael Judge. Since then he made it to the final of the Seniors Goff’s event, losing to Jimmy White and has just received a place on the Seniors tour for this season after winning the tournament in Bruges. We welcome Rodney onto the Seniors tour and wish you all the best for forthcoming events.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Which way, left or right?

-
Image
One of the greatest spats that occurred in snooker history was between my friend Alain Robidoux and Ronnie O’Sullivan. It occurred in 1996 at the World Championship. Ronnie, a then young whipper snapper at 19, trounced Alain in the match, winning 10-3. However beyond the win, a spat occurred when Ronnie decided to take a number of shots left handed. Robidoux criticised O’Sullivan after the match for being “disrespectful”. Ronnie hit back at Alain saying “if he wants to act like a baby that’s up to him” adding “ the crowd enjoyed it, that’s the main thing”. This was probably the first time that a player had dared to take multiple shots left handed and led to players attempting the same feat. Perhaps this wouldn’t have been become a regular occurrence if this hadn’t of happened. This snooker bust up led to Alain refusing to shake Ronnie’s hand at the end of the match. Robidoux later explained his actions saying “Ronnie was being disrespectful to his fellow professionals and should sa
Read more

Place your bets

-
Image
Match fixing in snooker has unfortunately been in operation since the very early days of the game with reports of Joe Davis having "carried" weaker opponents in multi-session matches to maximise the gate revenue. This trait continued through the history of the sport with players such as Willie Thorne and Alex Higgins claiming they were offered large sums of money to lose matches. Players may not enter a match fixing agreement on their own free will, being subject to threats of violence if they fail to submit. The lucrative criminal act is largely based in the Far East where gangs devise money making scams in various sports, using their players to infiltrate the individual sport and extract multimillion currency earnings. Although this happens, World Snooker has been very vigilant to attempt to stamp out this criminal activity in recent years. The main punishment being heavy fines or bans from the game. Recognisable figures such as Quentin Hann, Stephen Lee and Joe Joggi
Read more

The Ooty Club, birthplace of snooker

-
Image
Snooker was first born millions of miles away from the UK in a small town in the Nilgiri hills of Southern India. Recently Dennis Taylor went to this club and played on the first ever table produced. The Ooty Colonial Club was set up amongst 65 hill stations for the British army. Built by Sir William Rumbold In 1836, the club was built in a colonial style  and houses a bar and billiard room. A relic of the Raj period, the mixed bar still has a strict dress code and is set in a building and surrounding area that could be produced by bursting a time bubble and even has the original ball room. Inside the Billiards Room, stands the first ever snooker table made. A rare antique that is still playable and reminds us how old the game and how far it has travelled
Read more