Holiday cup hat-trick for Hughes

IT WAS a roller-coaster seven days of green-baize action for a 12-year-old Hampshire lad.

Ryan Hughes (pictured) passed a personal milestone en route to being crowned king of the school holiday competitions at his home club before ending the week in a “baptism of fire” on the Cuestars circuit.

The Chandler’s Ford Snooker Club youngster added the Autumn Half-Term Cup to the Easter Cup and the Ken Jones May Half-Term Cup he collected earlier in 2014.

Hughes, who had been stuck on a high break of 19 for six months, said the highlight of the five days of skills training and competitions was a seven-ball 22 achieved on the third day.

“The balls were quite spread out and they were open to all pockets,” he explained.

“After that, I started winning more games and that put me into the lead.”

Rotary Summer Cup champion Bowen Zhu, ten, finished nine points back in second.

Harvey Banger and eight-year-old Oliver Sykes were joint third. Charlie Pringle was fourth.

Hughes did spare a thought for his good friend Banger, who topped the rankings after the second day, revealing: “At the start of the week, he said he really wanted to win this cup.”

The lads reconvene on December 22 for the start of the Christmas Cup.

Hughes then retained the Division 1 lead in the Eastleigh & District Under-19 League before travelling to Swindon for his Cuestars South of England Under-21 Bronze Tour debut.

He lost all four group-stage matches in what dad Grahame described as a “baptism of fire”.

Report and picture by Tim Dunkley