Tourneys
Topic: EPT Harrow

it'd be interesting to know what the Euro's thought about the table/club conditions...

Message from Big Dave.

Semi final scores

N. Raybone 10 - 2 M. Hyden
D. Peach 10 - 7 Pat Holtz

who won?

daryl beat neil raybone 10-6

ey up! bit dodgey!!!! DARYL WINNING HIS OWN TOUR???

haha only kidding!

Well played Daryl you beat a tough field!

well done dazzler for a fanatstic win and a fantastic event absoluteley awesome

Thanks to all that came to Harrow. I'm sure you'll agree that it was a memorable event. My heart is 100% in this, I love the whole scene and I'm really enjoying getting to know all of you guys. The EPT is now firmly on the map and you have my personal guarantee that both myself and Daryl will continue to do everything in our power to bring you bigger and better tournaments. We are 100% committed to it, and all of you out there. Thank You, and your loyalty will be repaid in kind. Mark

Hello there its Neil Raybone Really enjoyed the tournament the weekend however really disappointed i didnt do my self justice all throughout the final. However its only my third american tournament so gonna try take the positive things from it. I wondered also why i only got 950 for getting to final when it said guranteed 1000 for runner up.

Hi everyone, superb weekend of pool.
The event ran really smoothly and i beleive everyone was pleased with the EPT London Open.
As everyone knows, this is only the second EPT event, and we are already attracting such players as Ronnie O'sullivan, Mika Immonen, and Marcus Chamat, so that was very pleasing for me.
The only way is up from now on for the EPT, and we hope to see you all at the next event in Solihull in October.

Neil, the reason for the 5% deduction in all EPT payouts is all published on the EPT website, and its because of the following:

We use an online payment system (paypal/credit card/debit card) and every time an entry fee is taken we get charged £3....Now, rather than ask players to pay the extra £3 when they enter, we take it from the Total prize fund, this way its more straight forward, and the players that dont earn any prize money from the event dont get penalized either.

You played a superb tournament Neil, and like you said already......you should take all the plus points and not the negatives (there aint many of em anyway)....Many people/players that i spoke to were very impressed with your play and manner around the table, you are a credit to the game.


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tax.....

great tourmamnet unlucky neil..well done dazzler...

Fantastic tournament, congratulations Daryl. The ways things are bein run by Daryl and Mark Mills I think the future of UK Pool is in safe hands.

LOL....tax Dyno hehehehe.

See you in Reno Daz!!


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Thanks so much Cusack and again, to all of you. Well played Neil. The admin % will be helps us cover entry processing costs, paypal, credit card fees etc, but as soon as we are breaking even, we'll take this out completely, and/or reduce the entry fees with the same or quite possibly more prize money. To show our loyalty to the top 100 ranked players, ie, most of the people who have entered our first 2 events, and to those that travelled from afar, We'd love to eventually make this "silly money" entry for them without compromising the prize fund or keep the entry around the same and increase the prizes substancially, or maybe even pay more places. This will be easy if we can get enough or the right sponsers in to cover the prize fund or even boost it up to unprecidented levels and with some of the names involved, and admittedly though only 2 events, still a track record, I now believe we can get some of those sponsors in. I've been making phone calls all morning. I should be working on my day to day business but I'm buzzing so am trying to strike while the iron is hot. I'm working on our future as we speak. We're going to make this the biggest and the best. Myself and Daryl will have plenty of time to sit down in Reno and talk EPT. Event 3 will be bigger and better, Just leave it to us. The future is bright, the future is 8ball. Mark

Hi ya...

At the airport right now...
Really hoping that my flight won't be cancelled...
Just wanted to say that i've enjoyed the few days that i have been here...
I've seen some great matches...

Just wanted to thank everybody for making me feel at home....
Andd see you all soon again!!!

On 2006-08-13 17:19 , Danny Wrote:

We travelled all the way from Spain and spent a wonderful weekend at Harrow. I don’t know whether you want the pro´s views on the tournament but here are ours..

The club was all right, staff helpful and friendly even with the language barrier…The organisation of the tournament was exceptionally good and I have already told so to dazzler but I’m afraid the table conditions were nothing like what we are used to. On Thursday night we popped in and played few games. The tables were quite dirty, both the rails and the cloth but we thought that they would be cleaned for Saturday and also re-clothed.. (I´m afraid we are also used to this even prior to a regional tournament).    At our local pool hall, rails are wiped and tables hovered every night after closing….well, this could sound too much but I tell you that it makes a big difference both for the players and the life of the cloth.

Another issue was the cloth… ideally all tables should have the same but it seemed a big difference between playing on one table or the other (we had the same problem at our last Spanish championships and it was the most criticised issue amongst the players), also you could see that some of them were not properly levelled. I personally believe that a high level player can / should adapt to any playing conditions…. But the tables were ideal for a friendly game of pool (which is the club’s aim) but not for a tournament.

Another thing was the problem with spectators (I include myself).. I read some comments about disturbing players.. It was very difficult to watch a whole match without disturbing somebody. If the venue is held in a pool hall, this is a difficult question to solve and if you add to this that we had some big names playing I can’t see how we can prevent this from happening again.

Of course this is not a criticism but just pointing out things to improve…. We have a lot to learn from this experience in terms of the initiative of the organisers, the sacrifice of players who travel from far not knowing if they can get through one or two rounds and not even get the entry fee refunded and most of all the player’s support to this new adventure to improve the sport we all love. This initiative should be for us “a mirror in which we have to look at”…congratulations for the hard work and good luck in the future!!!

Hi Johanna, the aim of the EPT is to get out of the pool hall as soon as possible as I am sure UK Sports Management will confirm it is hoped this will be done sooner rather than later, At this moment we are at the mercy of the Rileys Clubs and if they do not renew the cloth then we have no say in that although they did recover two tables in brand new simonis cloth, Rileys Harrow you may find hard to believe was one of the better clubs for it's table conditions, but rest assured all your issues are already being addressed but it may take a tournament or two to sort this out but bear with us it will happen I am sure.

I wasn't there but I trust Johanna's words, I remember taking Spanish players to the south of England a few year's back and the biggest criticism was the cloths and the fact that in one club in which we played, the cloths were all a different colour.
Any club in Spain that is a member of the CEP would have its tables re-covered for an important tournament and as Johanna said, the tables are cleaned and vacuumed daily.
The 9 foot tables to be used for the next tournament in Malaga in September will certainly have new cloths.
I understand the problem you have by using Riley clubs (or any other company)and hope that the EPT grows big enough and powerful enough to have more say in how these companied treat their clients.
It is in their own interests to have a successful pro circuit playing in their premises.

Hi Johanna, we are so glad that you and all of the other European travelling parties really enjoyed the EPT London Open.
Just to clarify the issue with the tables/club situation......
......The EPT is aiming high for the future, and this includes every thinkable aspect.
One of the things we have looked deeply into is the table/club situation, and beleive me, we want to move away from the clubs as soon as we can....in the same breath i would like to say this is in no disrespect to the Riles Harrow, or for that matter Rileys Stretford clubs (EPT 1st event) as i beleive these to be good clubs with superb staff. Harrow did recloth 4 tables for the event, 2 with the Simonis cloth provided by our sponsor, Simonis. And 2 with the regular rileys cloth, to be honnest this is better than us Brits are used to over here. I think that in clubs across Europe, the mainland Europe have much better equipment than here in the UK, of that there is no doubt!
At this moment in time, the condition of the club tables is out of our hands somewhat, as there are not many clubs in the UK with 20 tables plus (required for EPT events)

I hope this gives you an insight to what we are aiming for and the position we are currently in.

The main thing for us is that every player that enters an EPT event enjoys there weekend, win or lose, and that they hopefully come back for future EPT events, supporting the tour which in effect will move this superbly oiled machine, which is the Empire Pool Tour, forward.


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20 Tables.... I wish,

We don't have a single club in Spain with anywhere near that number of 9 foot tables.

That's why we use Hotels etc for our major tournaments and that gives us enough headaches.

However, our motivation is no different to your's, to provide the best tournaments in the best venues that we can to raise the level and image of the sport.

Keep up the good work Daryl and Mark, judging by the comments on this site, you have certainly started well.