Northern Ireland Trophy
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 Snooker tournaments |
| Ranking tournaments |
| World Championship |
| UK Championship |
| Grand Prix |
| Welsh Open |
| China Open |
| Shanghai Masters |
| Northern Ireland Trophy |
| Other tournaments |
| Masters |
| Premier League |
| Pot Black |
| Malta Cup |
| Withdrawn tournaments |
| See: Snooker tournaments |
The Northern Ireland Trophy is a professional snooker tournament. It began as an invitational event introduced for the 2005/06 season and was contested by 20 players. From the 2006/07 season, it is a full ranking event, attended by the world's top 32 players plus 16 qualifiers.
The event is the first major tournament to be held in Northern Ireland and has been staged as part of World Snooker's continuing efforts to popularise the game in more territories.
The tournament currently takes place at the Waterfront Hall, Belfast in early November. Prize money for 2006 totalled £200,500 ($387,586) with the winner receiving £30,000 ($57,992).
In the 2006 Northern Ireland Trophy Ronnie O'Sullivan, broke a world record during his semi-final against Dominic Dale. He won the match in 53 minutes of play, which was the fastest ever time in best-of-11 match.
[edit] Winners
| Year | Winner | Opponent | Final score | Season |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2005 | Matthew Stevens-  Wales |
Stephen Hendry-  Scotland |
9 - 7 | 2005/06 |
| 2006 | Ding Junhui-  China |
Ronnie O'Sullivan-  England |
9 - 6 | 2006/07 |
| 2007 | Stephen Maguire- Scotland |
Fergal O'Brien-  Ireland |
9 - 5 | 2007/08 |
[edit] Media coverage
The Northern Ireland Trophy currently gets shown live on British Eurosport , British Eurosport 2 and TG4.
