MAGUIRE IN CREDIT DESITE MCGILL LOSS

Stephen Maguire occasionally gets some stick for his ‘heart on the sleeve’ reactions to and irritation with poor shots and misfortune in the arena while playing – much of it a little hard to understand, especially when Barry Hearn has called for players to show more true emotion during matches.

We hear that those reactions have even seen him hauled up before the authorities in the past, when there are any number of other things that would seem to merit more serious action in that respect. It is easy to sympathise sometimes with players who are left unsure of exactly what they can and can’t say or do without getting fined.

On a personal level, if drawing up a snooker ‘crime’ sheet there are some obvious ones from the match-fixing downwards, and very much towards the bottom would be expressing emotion at the table (with the possible exception of audibly swearing live on TV at family viewing times), and criticism of official table, cloth and ball manufacturers.

But Maguire was as generous as it is possible to get after such a draining match and defeat towards debutant Anthony McGill. After clawing his way back from 9-5 down to level at 9-9 Maguire went the way of Mark King in final qualifying, watching McGill knock in a century in the decider.

He had the good grace to tell McGill in the arena not to freeze against Mark Selby because he could give him a good game, and rather than excuse his defeat by claiming his opponent was brilliant was honest enough to say McGill can play a lot better.

MAGUIRE PULLS OUT OF CHINA OPEN

The withdrawal of Stephen Maguire from the China Open with a bad back, a problem that troubled him at the Welsh Open earlier this year, brought to three the number of players who will not be travelling to Beijing after the draw was made. Maguire had been due to play Dave Harold, who will receive a bye into the last 32 and a guaranteed minimum of £6,500 from the prize-money pot. The same applies to Martin O’Donnell, who was due to play Stuart Bingham (family funeral), and Alfie Burden (Tony Drago, no reason given but has always had a strong fear of flying).

The Ronnie O’Sullivan ‘forgotten chalk’ narrow escape at the mid-session interval of his BetVictor Welsh Open semi-final against Barry Hawkins saw the world champion rush back to his cue case and back with around 15 seconds to spare before the players were ushered into the arena.

But with the Rocket himself raising the infamous Shaun Murphy/Stephen Maguire situation, now fully a decade go at the 2004 Grand Prix, in his post-match press conference it is probably worth clarifying both the rules and what actually happened in that incident.

There are effectively two ways a player can be docked a frame on this issue, by the tournament director for not being ready to play, or by the referee once the frame has started. Maguire was penalised for not being ready in the first place, so would have been docked a frame whether or not Murphy had spoken to referee Johan Oomen.

The fact that he did has caused him a lot of damage to his reputation, because other players were always going to see that as an unsportsmanlike attempt to ‘steal’ a frame. Murphy himself protested he only asked where Maguire was. The referee fed back to the tournament office that Murphy had brought up the question of the rules, so it became almost a case of who to believe.

Once the frame has started the referee is in charge and has discretion, and does not have to ask the opponent if they consent to a player going back to get their chalk. They can make that decision themselves, and either let the player go immediately, or make him wait until the end of the frame. Technically the referee has the power to dock a player a frame for this, but that is not the advice currently given and in practice would be very unlikely to happen.

It was like that moment when someone hurriedly takes the black-ish suitcase off the airport baggage belt and leaves for home, without checking the name. John Higgins and close friend Stephen Maguire finished their last-32 matches at almost exactly the same time on Wednesday night, the older man having beaten Mark King 4-0 with the defending champion seeing off Andrew Pagett by the same scoreline. The pair rattled through their press duties, both looking to take advantage of a relatively early 8.30pm finish and enjoy something of the evening. But in his haste Higgins, picking up what is an admittedly similar case to his own, rushed out of the Newport Centre building with Maguire’s cue. Rolling his eyes Maguire left with Higgins’ own playing equipment, hoping to track his pal down as soon as possible for an exchange before their last-16 matches on Thursday.