Setting the Standard

By Elliott West

Introduction

In every sport there is always a trailblazer and none more so than in women’s snooker. In the modern era, the first person who would come to mind, is the twelve times World Champion, Reanne Evans but cast your mind further back and your finger will hover above the name, Allison Fisher. Born in Cheshunt in 1968, and started playing when she was only seven years old, winning her first title when she was seventeen. Fisher has a phenomenal record in both snooker and later billiards and pool, clocking up 80 national titles and 11 world titles in total.

The Rise to the Top

Allison Fisher is a instantly recognisable face of women’s snooker and can be found promoting the sport in many media appearances, pictured with many players of the time and often appeared on the BBC programme, Big Break, alongside presenters Jim Davidson and John Virgo. However away from the media spotlight, Fisher was busy carving out her cue sports’ career, primarily in snooker. Like any true champion, she had the true hunger to win and spent a large section of her snooker, career in the 1980s, attempting to be part of the male, professional tour.

Turning professional in 1991, thanks to a change in the snooker entry ruling, Fisher now only had to pay an entry fee. Her professional career on the women’s tour then took off and spanned from 1991-1997. Prior to turning professional, Allison had already won the Women’s World Snooker Championship, an amazing seven times and had frankly already set the standard in the female game. Excluding her World Championship titles, she additionally won nine titles between 1985 and 1995, a combination of single and doubles titles.

Frankly, Allison’s professional snooker career, doesn’t do her justice as a player. The tough grind of the qualifying booths, meant she had to compete in a pool of 500 players, having to win consecutive matches, to have a whiff of a chance of playing on the main tour. I have heard many tales from players past and present about their days of trying to qualify at places like the Norbreck Castle Hotel. Some like it and others loathed it, causing a few to seriously look hard at whether they wanted to continue this arduous crusade.

Allison was one of those snooker players that became disillusioned with this crusade. She also felt that she wasn’t getting the same respect as the male players. Her best performance in the qualifiers was in at 1994 World Championship qualifiers when she reached round four, losing to Roger Garrett, 10-4. By 1997, Fisher had lost her professional status and after searching long and hard, decided to make the brave and bold decision, to move to the USA and attempt to reinvent herself as a billiards and pool player, joining the WPBA, winning a swathe of titles between 1995 and 2012, including being a four times World 9 Ball champion, a World Games Gold Medallist and a winner of fifty plus WPBA billiards titles.

Summary

Allison Fisher is undoubtedly one of the best female players that has ever graced the snooker circuit. She has shown that gender has nothing to do with ability and paved the way for other women to home in on their natural ability and play snooker or any cue sport to the highest standard and level. Allison made her highest break of 133 at the 1992 Dubai Classic qualifiers, had 11 century breaks, highest ranking of 191 in 1995, her best performance, reaching the last 96 of the 1992 Dubai Classic and made an astonishing £5,773,460 in career earnings. A lady who represented sport on a national and international level, Fisher was voted ‘Female Player of the Year’ in 2007 and was inducted into the Billiard Congress of America Hall of Fame in 2009. She is also a pool commentator for Sky Sports.