World Open (snooker)
The World Open (currently Haikou World Open, formerly held under the name Professional Players Tournament, Grand Prix and LG Cup) is a professional snooker tournament, which counts for Snooker Main Tour.
History
The tournament was founded in 1982 as the Professional Players Tournament of the WPBSA. The first conference, Ray Reardon won against Jimmy White with 10:5 and received a prize of £ 5,000.
1984 Rothmans sponsor of the tournament, which was renamed the Rothmans Grand Prix and took place in Reading. 1993 Škoda was the main sponsor for three years, between 1996 and 2000 there was none. In 2001, LG Electronics sponsorship for a period of three years where the Grand Prix was called the LG Cup. In 2004 he was named after the new sponsor totesport Grand Prix.
Until 2005, each year was played for the season opener at the Guild Hall in Preston. From 2006/ 07 the tournament was sponsored by Royal London Watches, and took place in 2006 and 2007 in Aberdeen, Scotland, as the second ranking tournament of the season after the Northern Ireland Trophy or the Shanghai Masters instead. In 2008, the tournament was moved to Glasgow, the tour calendar, it was the third event of the season.
A novelty in 2006 was the first time in a ranking tournament ( in 2007 ) discharged group stage. In the 2007 /08 season, awarded the Grand Prix world ranking points were raised to 1.25 times a normal tournament. This was upgraded the Grand Prix for the third most important snooker tournament ( after the UK Championship and the World Cup). In the 2008 /09 season, the controversial group stage was abolished. To give the Grand Prix still has its own character, the pairings were now after each round paired once again (for all other tournaments, there is a fixed tournament tree).
2010, the Grand Prix was held under the new name World Open. It was a Pro-Am tournament in which both professionals and amateurs can participate, had the latter first two qualifying rounds to survive. The field of participants increased to 128 players, also the match distance was shortened drastically ( Best of 9 in the final ).
2012, the changes were reversed and the tournament to Haikou, China laid.
Most titles profits, namely four, made so far, the two Scots Stephen Hendry and John Higgins.