With the penultimate qualifying event – the International Championship – concluding this weekend in China, Matchroom Sport can announce that the final seeded player for the Champion of Champion will be Scotland’s John Higgins.
The current World No. 12 is the highest ranked player already qualified who wasn’t previously seeded and will take his place in Group One alongside Joe Perry. Currently Ding Junhui is the 16th and final player in the Champion of Champions but that could all change if Thepchaiya Un-Nooh or David Gilbert were to win the International. Failing that eventuality, a new winner at next week’s Bulgarian Open could sneak in ahead of Ding.
The 2015 Champion of Champions takes place at the Ricoh Arena, Coventry from 10th to 15th November and features previous winners of World Snooker-sanctioned events over the previous 12 months.
The eight seeded players are Stuart Bingham, Judd Trump, John Higgins, Joe Perry, Neil Robertson, Shaun Murphy, Mark Selby and Barry Hawkins. The unseeded players are Michael White, Stephen Maguire, Kyren Wilson, Zhou Yuelong, Yan Bingtao, Ali Carter and Rory McLeod. They will be joined by Ding Junhui provided there is not a new winner at the International or Bulgarian Open.
Each seeded player will play an unseeded opponent in a best-of-seven group match in the afternoon session with the two winners clashing over 11 frames in the evening. The four group winners will proceed to the best-of-11 semi-finals on Saturday, November 14 before Sunday, November 15 sees a two-session final played over 19 frames.
Group Fixtures
Tuesday November 10, Group 3 (first match at 1pm)
Stuart Bingham (3) v To Be Drawn
Judd Trump (6) v To Be Drawn
Wednesday, November 11, Group 1 (first match at 1pm)
John Higgins v To Be Drawn
Joe Perry (8) v To Be Drawn
Thursday, November 12, Group 4 (first match at 1pm)
Neil Robertson (4) v To Be Drawn
Shaun Murphy (5) v To Be Drawn
Friday, November 13, Group 2 (first match at 1pm)
Mark Selby (2) v To Be Drawn
Barry Hawkins (7) v To Be Drawn
Tickets for this year’s Champion of Champions are now on sale at The Ticket Factory from just £10. Standard priced tickets for the weekend sessions are now sold out, but in anticipation of extra seats being released a waiting list has been set up at https://championofchampionssnooker.co.uk/tickets/.
The participation of all players is subject to contract.
