2021 Northern Ireland Open


The 2021 Northern Ireland Open was a professional ranking snooker tournament that took place from 9 to 17 October 2021 at the Waterfront Hall in Belfast, Northern Ireland. It was the third ranking event of the 2021–22 season and the first tournament in both the Home Nations Series and the European Series. It was the sixth edition of the Northern Ireland Open.
Qualifying for the tournament took place from 23 to 27 August 2021 at the Morningside Arena in Leicester, England, although matches involving the top 16 players, and three other matches featuring Northern Irish players, were held over and played at the Waterfront Hall. All of the top 16 players participated except for world number 9 Ding Junhui. Mark Allen made a maximum break in his held over qualifying match against Si Jiahui.
The defending champion was Judd Trump, who defeated Ronnie O'Sullivan in the 2018, 2019 and 2020 finals by a scoreline of 9–7 each time. Trump lost 3–5 in the quarter-finals to Allen, having led 3–0.
Allen faced John Higgins in the final, which was tied at 4–4 after the afternoon session. Higgins moved 8–6 ahead in the evening session, but Allen won the last three frames for a 9–8 victory. It was Allen's first Northern Ireland Open title, his second Home Nations win, and the sixth ranking title of his professional career.

Format

The Northern Ireland Open was first played in 2016, and was won by Mark King. The 2021 event was the first of four Home Nations Series events, and the third world ranking tournament of the 2019–20 snooker season. The event took place from 9 to 17 October 2021 at the Waterfront Hall in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The event followed the British Open, and preceded the English Open.
The defending champion was Judd Trump, who defeated Ronnie O'Sullivan in the 2018, 2019 and 2020 finals by a scoreline of 9–7 each time. All matches were played as the best of 7 in the first four rounds, at which point the number increased: 9 in the quarter-finals; 11 in the semi-finals; and the best of 19 frames in the final. Sports betting company BetVictor sponsored the event, which was broadcast in Europe by Eurosport; CCTV, Rigour, Liaoning TV in China; NowTV in Hong Kong; Astro SuperSports in Malaysia and Brunei; True Vision in Thailand; Sky Sports in New Zealand and Matchroom Sport in all other territories.

Prize fund

The breakdown of prize money for this event is shown below:
  • Winner: £70,000
  • Runner-up: £30,000
  • Semi-final: £20,000
  • Quarter-final: £10,000
  • Last 16: £7,500
  • Last 32: £4,000
  • Last 64: £3,000
  • Highest break: £5,000
  • Total: £405,000

    Main draw

The results from the event are shown below. Seeded players have their seedings in brackets. Players highlighted in bold denote match winners.

Top half

Bottom half

Final

Qualifying

Qualification for the tournament took place from 23 to 27 August 2021 at the Morningside Arena in Leicester, England. Matches involving the top 16 players — including the defending champion — alongside three other matches involving local players, were held over and played at the Waterfront Hall. Graeme Dott, Anthony Hamilton, Mark Davis and Robbie McGuigan were due to take part in the event, but withdrew and were replaced by James Cahill, Dylan Emery, Mark Lloyd and Robert McCullough respectively.
An incident took place in the players lounge after the Peter Lines v Xiao Guodong match. Lines confronted Xiao in the players' lounge after the match, accused him of cheating. Lines also swore at Xiao, and challenged him to a fight, leading to security personnel removing Lines from the lounge. The incident was in relation to perceived inaccuracies in ball placement by the referee after a foul and a miss was called during a frame of their match. The incident was reported to the WPBSA and Lines was found guilty at a subsequent hearing after the tournament of; breaching the code of conduct for members of the WPBSA, bringing the WPBSA into disrepute, bringing the game of snooker into disrepute, and for engaging in conduct likely to cause an opponent to be unduly influenced so as to affect the outcome of a match or event. Lines was ordered to pay a fine and costs. Lines subsequently apologised for his conduct to Xiao.
  • 4–1
  • 0–4
  • 3–4
  • 2–4
  • 2–4
  • 2–4
  • 4–2
  • 2–4
  • 2–4
  • 3–4
  • 2–4
  • 4–1
  • 4–1
  • 4–1
  • 1–4
  • 4–2
  • 4–2
  • 2–4
  • 3–4
  • 3–4
  • 4–1
  • 1–4
  • 4–3
  • 4–2
  • 3–4
  • 3–4
  • 4–2
  • 4–3
  • 4–2
  • 4–1
  • 2–4
  • 4–0
  • 4–0
  • 2–4
  • 1–4
  • 4–1
  • 4–0
  • 3–4
  • 2–4
  • 0–4
  • 4–2
  • 4–1
  • 2–4
  • 4–1
  • 1–4
  • 4–3
  • 4–0
  • 4–0
  • 4–2
  • 3–4
  • 4–1
  • 4–0
  • 4–1
  • 3–4
  • 4–2
  • 2–4
  • 0–4
  • 4–0
  • 3–4
  • 3–4
  • 4–0
  • 4–0
  • 3–4
  • 4–1

    Century breaks

Main stage centuries

Total: 50
Total: 29