The Talking Balls Podcast

Cracking talk with one of the main men running the sport, Chair of the WPBSA and former pro player Jason Ferguson.
We got a good insight into the decision-making around venues, tournament format, TV rights, sponsorship etc as well as an insight into the jet-setting lifestyle of a leader in the sport.

Check us out at www.talkingballs.org and email us at [email protected]
We're on lots of social media channels and our videos of most of these episodes are on our YouTube Channel.
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It's still early in the lifetime of the Talking Balls podcast and have just passed three months and now 25 episodes.
So to do something different and look back at some of the conversations so far, we invite you to listen to some quick-fire questions and answers with a number of pro players including Neil Robertson, Michael Holt, Jackson Page, Hayden Staniland and Martin O' Donnell.

Check us out at www.talkingballs.org and email us at [email protected]
We're on lots of social media channels and our videos of most of these episodes are on our YouTube Channel.
Please like us, subscribe, follow, rate etc to get the word out to others.

Music from Uppbeat (free for Creators!):
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We recorded this the day before Phil Haigh ran a story on Metro.co.uk focusing on Stephen Maguire's reaction upon playing Martin in the recent British Open. Martin's slow play was talked about and he encounters some hostility because of it from some players.
In this episode he shows that he has a good sense of humour and explains more about his approach to the sport as well as a dose of defiance when the subject of average shot times comes up.

Good talk!

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We talked with stadium announcer/MC extraordinaire Phil Seymour who was a cracking guest. We caught up with him from his hotel room in Leicester on the night before he started presenting again at the British Open latter stages.
An interesting talk about his background, interest in charity and a few anecdotes too.

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By now you may well have read about this episode on social media or some of the newspapers where stories emerged of Neil not liking the Crucible and the World Championships format.
There is a good 2 hour conversation with Neil about that but so much more and we hope that listening to this encourages others in the sport to come forward and talk with the same candour giving us all more insight into those who make the sport so great.

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This was the second and concluding part of our conversation with Neil Robertson.
Hope you enjoy it as much as we did!

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We recorded this episode in 2 parts and talked around a range of subjects. Since moving over from the other side of the World to make his career, Neil has established himself as the best player every to come out of Australia and an all time great.

We talked about the short format of the opening tournaments of the new season and heard Neil's thoughts on the longer formats used for the World Championships.

Neil comes across as a very focused though relaxed and thoughtful man and he was a fine guest.

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Being Nottingham based and as a fan of the mighty Reds, I was looking forward to spending some time in the company of one of the best sporting exports to come out of the city.

Michael was a joy to talk with - we went off on a lot of tangents with chat about life, kindness, families, meditation, practice, politics, coaching, media work etc. and it was as close to having a chat down the pub as Zoom allows!

Hope you enjoy, thanks Michael.

Please rate/subscribe/like etc and tell people about us. By the way, we have a Fantasy League, Predictions League and PlayStation Snooker Ladder which you can out more about via our website www.talkingballs.org and you can also join our community page at Discord https://discord.com/invite/cBhJV9pQ

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"The wrong Brian", "are these the Brian's you're looking for?" "he is not the messiah, he's a very naughty boy" etc etc

Ok so, funny although embarrassing story. I invited one superfan, Kellie Barker to the podcast and a second, known by thousands in snooker as Brian and on the day of the recording was told that i'd invited the wrong Brian!!!

I was after the one who keeps popping up at snooker events on the front row and other events such as the Euros football, cricket test matches etc. and invited a different Brian who is involved in James Bond podcasts as well as being a big snooker fan.

Luckily, everyone saw the funny side (I think). We had a great talk about the game, views on the short format in the first two ranking events of the season, stories of players behind the scenes etc. A really fun talk, hope you like! I think that we'll do these type of talks again more often.

Michael

Please rate/subscribe/like etc and tell people about us. By the way, we have a Fantasy League, Predictions League and PlayStation Snooker Ladder which you can out more about via our website www.talkingballs.org and you can also join our community page at Discord https://discord.com/invite/cBhJV9pQ

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Hayden was a great guest and clearly very focused and determined but humble in how he is learning to improve his game.
He was unlucky not to progress in Q School this season despite an eye-catching win over Luo Honghao on the way but he is not about to give up.


Shout outs to some of the people who have supported him so far in his early career - Nigel Turner and Macauley Croft.
A player to watch. Enjoy this episode.

LeeMcAllister 'Mac' made his co-hosting debut in the episode recorded with Hayden Staniland on 19 July 2021 and took to it like a duck to water.

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