Mark Green: British universities double champion
SALISBURY’S Mark Green (left) is the British universities champion.
The 19-year-old claimed the individual title at the British Universities & Colleges Sport (BUCS) Championships at the Northern Snooker Centre in Leeds.
And, in a rare double, he was also a member of the Cardiff University side that won the team title.
“It was really great to win double gold as it’s very rarely done and never been done by a first year (student),” said Green, who defeated Mike Walsh, from the University of York, 3-2 in the final.
And it was nearly an all-Cuestars final.
Layton Brooks, Green’s Cardiff team-mate and old Salisbury Snooker Club team-mate, lost 2-0 to Walsh in the semi-finals.
Cardiff’s first team accounted for York 3-2 in the team final. And their strength was recognised by the team they beat 6-2 in the last-four.
Tom Foley, captain of the University of Southampton side, said: “Cardiff were outstanding.”
And Foley’s team-mate Tom Norton declared: “Cardiff were the strongest team I’ve ever seen at BUCS.”
In the Southampton first team was another former Cuestars member, David Joce, formerly of Aldershot, and in their thirds was Tom McIvor, formerly of Bracknell.
Green, who is studying Politics and Economics, is the first Cardiff student to claim the gold medal in the individuals and the first to win the BUCS title and the Midland Cup title in the same season. Cardiff also won the team event at both competitions.
“Hopefully this will help me for the rest of the season,” said Green, who heads back to Leeds on April 9 for the last-16 stage of the English Under-19 Championship.
Green has been awarded a Sports Bursary by Cardiff University Sport and is on their High Performance Sports Programme.
Jonathan Spark, yet another Cuestars old boy, from Poole, was in action for Exeter. He topped the break board in the Trophy competition with a 53. And his side took silver in the second-tier team competition.
Cuestars director John Hunter has passed on his congratulations.