By Elliott West
Introduction
The 1978 UK Championship was a professional non-ranking tournament, held between 22nd November and 1st December, 1978 at the Guild Hall in Preston. In the final, Doug Mountjoy won the first of his UK titles, defeating David Taylor 15-9, finishing in style with a break of 120 and walking away with a cheque for £3,500.
The 1978 tournament was the first of twenty UK Championships to be held at the Guild Hall and the first time it was sponsored by Coral, a partnership that lasted until 1985 and in 1978 saw Graham Miles make the highest break of 139 in his quarter-final clash with Willie Thorne. A match where Miles defeated his opponent 9-1. There was also a shock in the qualifiers with Terry Griffiths, recently having turned professional, losing to Rex Williams 8-9 after leading the match 8-2. David Taylor and Roy Andrewartha also produced shock defeats by knocking out Alex Higgins 9-5 and John Spencer 9-8 respectfully.
The Tournament
First Round
David Taylor beat Patsy Fagan 9-7
The opening match brought the first shock as Patsy Fagan, the holder, went down to David Taylor, who could have been backed at 66-1 to win the title before play started.
Taylor made a fine start, winning the first four frames as Fagan struggled to put his game together. He had his chances but did not make the most of them and the former world amateur champion was also able to take advantage of some slack safety play from the Irishman.
After the first interval, Fagan came back strongly and at the halfway stage had levelled at 4-4. A break of 72 in the fifth frame no doubt helped him regain his confidence.
In the evening session, Fagan moved into a three-frame lead by stretching his winning sequence to seven but the match was to turn around in dramatic fashion.
Without making any breaks, Taylor started to pull back. He drew level and then incredibly won the next two frames to move into the quarter-finals.
John Virgo beat John Pulman 9-3
Until Virgo produced a 78 in the last frame, the match hardly rose above mediocrity.
Virgo had trouble weighing up the speed of the table and while Pulman went into a 2-0 lead, he failed to capitalise on his opponent’s numerous errors.
The seventh was a classic as far as that was concerned. Virgo took the first red and split the pack just about perfectly in potting the black. Would he clear the table?
The answer came when Virgo was on 45. He failed to pot a simple red and left Pulman the chance to sweep up. He sunk that red all right – but preceded to miss the black.
Leading 5-3 at halfway, Virgo settled down more afterwards to run out an easy winner.
Fred Davis beat John Dunning 9-2
One intrepid punter backed Dunning to win the championship, staking £100 at 100-1, and with the Yorkshireman getting off to a flying start with a 64 break probably thought he was going to get a run for his money.
But Davis was back in the game straightaway, making a 67 in the next frame and a 78 in the third. It was the end of the road as far as Dunning was concerned and at 8-1 he appeared to be going out meekly.
The Yorkshireman then buckled down to it and produced a superb 101, the first century of the championships. Eight blacks, a blue, a green and all the colours completed the break which saw Dunning ending it by potting the pink which was close to the yellow pocket, running through to the bottom cushion before side took the cue-ball behind the black via cushions on either side of the table.
Davis wrapped it up in the next frame to qualify for a repeat in the quarter-finals of those classic clashes he had with Alex Higgins in the world championships of 1973 and 1974.
Alex Higgins beat Jim Meadowcroft 9-6
Higgins, nothing like at his best, almost let the game slip from his grasp but won through after Meadowcroft had pulled back from 3-8 to 6-8.
Meadowcroft could so have easily caused an upset. The first two frames went to the black and Meadowcroft lost both of them when he failed to pot the green from similar situations. The remaining colours were all nicely placed for the clearance. The Irish champion proceeded to win the first four frames.
Meadowcroft was often let down by sloppy potting at a time when he looked set to make frame-winning breaks. In the fifteen frames he bettered 30 only on two occasions.
Willie Thorne beat Ray Reardon 9-6
Full marks to Thorne who had the world professional champion in trouble from the start.
Thorne won the first three frames and at halfway led 5-3. The Leicester was at his very best in the second and third frames when some fluent cueing produced breaks of 56 and 38, which put him 2-0 up, and a table-clearing 51 which started when he was seven behind in the third.
Reardon described his own game as “pathetic” at the interval, but that didn’t distract in any way from Thorne’s display.
He had been deadly when given the chance and thoroughly deserved his lead.
Reardon’s traditional fighting qualities were bound to come out in the second half and sure enough, within the space of four frames he was level.
Thorne had gone 6-3 in front but the sponsors still kept Reardon’s match winning odds at around 1-3 (they had been at 1-7 before play started).
They well knew how well Reardon could bare his teeth but it turned out to be all rather like the Tuborg television commercial with the champion taking a back seat as Thorne reeled off three successive victories to go into the quarter-finals.
Graham Miles beat Rex Williams 9-8
Rex Williams, as he did in the qualifying round, staged a splendid comeback and was a shady unlucky not to win. The recovery was nothing like as sensational as when he beat Terry Griffiths, but at 6-8 the pressure was well and truly on him.
Williams had to clear the colours to take the match to the decider and this he did with some ice cool potting, cleverly pushing the blue off the cushion, then, with just the black left putting that away with the cue-ball only an inch off the side cushion, the colour on its spot and the shot almost straight.
It was Williams who produced the best break of the first day when moving to 4-5 with the aid of an excellent 95. Other breaks of 70 and 72 kept Miles on his toes and the former Pot Black champion found himself 6-5 down at one stage.
The match was decided when Miles stepped in to make a break of 40 in the 17th frame. He was leading 42-10 and with last six reds becoming more and more of an invitation to put the issue beyond doubt. Miles took them along with the yellow and green.
Doug Mountjoy beat Dennis Taylor 9-4
Taylor would want to forget this match as quickly as possible. The No.6 seed could do little right throughout the entire match and even when he made a break of 54, the only time he went beyond 30, Mountjoy went on to win the frame.
Referee Jim Thorpe was forced to declare the first frame void when nine reds clustered around the black, which was hanging over a corner pocket. The stalemate came after 20 minutes and quite rightly the frame was re-started.
While Mountjoy found himself 1-2 down, he won eight of the next ten frames without having to break sweat as Taylor only offered weak resistance.
The sponsors had made Mountjoy a 5-2 chance to beat Taylor. Many experts thought that 9-4 Taylor was good value for money. How wrong they could have been!
Roy Andrewartha beat John Spencer 9-8
Spencer played, probably his worst sustained spell of championship snooker, finding himself 6-2 down at halfway. In those eight frames he had only a 43 break to his name and several times failed with straightforward pots, the sort of shot he could play blindfolded nine times out of ten.
Andrewartha gave nothing away and with Spencer showing no signs of recovering, he confidently put away a break of 54 in frame six to lead 4-2 and a 38 in frame eight to cause a buzz of excitement in the Guild Hall with an interval lead of 6-2.
Did Spencer have something up his sleeve? He didn’t look too happy during the adjournment, but as soon as play resumed the 1977 world champion began to wind up.
He took the ninth frame with the aid of a 45, the tenth with breaks of 43 and 48, the eleventh with a 55 and after thirteen frames had edged in front. Incredibly, Spencer was back from the dead.
Unfortunately for him, Andrewartha was not feeling the pressure as much as everyone had expected, for while Spencer made a 54 in the fourteen frame, victory went to the former English amateur championship finalist.
7-7 and then 8-8 – it was all on the decider. Andrewartha led 35-4: Spencer rattled in a 31 and the scores were level.
Andrewartha forged ahead again to lead by 28 on the green. Spencer got the snooker he wanted and the gap was back to 24. Then Andrewartha took the brown and later the blue and it was all over.
Quarter-Finals
David Taylor beat John Virgo 9-2
Taylor, played consistently well throughout this quarter-final, proving much too strong for Virgo, who was a big disappointment to his supporters.
Virgo was level at 1-1 but the longer the game went on, the further he fell behind and if there was a bit of luck going, it always fell to Taylor.
Taylor quickly got to grips with the problems of the match, making a 44 in the first frame. He never went beyond that afterwards but eight times he reached 30 or more, suggesting that Higgins would have no easy ride to reach the final.
When chances came Taylor snapped them up and Virgo looked decidedly dejected at the end.
Alex Higgins beat Fred Davis 9-4
The last frame of this quarter-final took 70 minutes to complete but there wasn’t anyone in the audience who dared leave.
Higgins, for once, matched the composure of Davis throughout the thirteen frames, something he didn’t always show against Meadowcroft.
Perhaps it was disappointing that a fluke on the black should take Higgins into the semi-finals, because that last frame did produce some of the best safety play one could wish to see.
A quick getaway by the Irishman saw him leading 5-0, the second frame having gone to the black. In the past, these two players had produced some thrilling clashes in the world championships but Davis had an awful lot to do as he fell behind 7-2 and then 8-2 in the second half.
In going 7-2 up, Higgins delivered breaks of 28, 45 and a 32 clearance in three successive visits but from them on it was more a case of pot and run as Higgins went to 8-2 and Davis pulled back to 8-4.
Davis led in the thirteenth frame until Higgins fluked the black, the ball crashing into the jaws of the top pocket, shooting across to near the middle pocket before crossing the table to land in the bottom pocket.
Graham Miles beat Willie Thorne 9-1
Thorne’s first round victory over Reardon pulled a big crowd around the No.1 table but this time it was Miles who produced some memorable snooker. He won the first frame by making a break of 92 and that obviously set the stage for what was to follow.
In the second frame, Thorne had a great chance to draw level when Miles left a very inviting black but Thorne missed, went in-off and was two down. The third frame saw Miles open with a 24 but Thorne pulled himself together to make what everyone thought would be a winning 61. But he got careless. Three down.
Miles made a 58 in the fourth and as he reeled off four more in a row, making a 70 in the eighth, all that remained for Thorne was to avoid a whitewash. Thorne did that in frame nine but the match was over in the next.
What a way to go out! Miles broke off, forcing Thorne to go for a pot which he missed in the top pocket. It was all over, for Miles put together a table clearance of 139.
Miles made it look so simple. “The best I have ever seen in tournament or match play” was Bill Werbenuik’s opinion.
During the dead frames, Thorne did make a 105 and that would have been 140 had he not jawed the last red.
Doug Mountjoy beat Roy Andrewartha 9-4
Out goes the other giant killer. Andrewartha did start well by taking by taking the first frame but Mountjoy had no intention of letting him getting away and an 83 in to he next brought him level.
Mountjoy took the lead in the third and was never headed again, shooting in front 4-2 with a 45 followed by a 52 clearance.
Andrewartha got past 30 only once, in the first frame, and as hard as he tried, Mountjoy always seemed to have that little bit extra up his sleeve.
At halfway he led 5-3. Andrewartha got to 5-4 but the former world amateur champion reeled off four in a row to qualify for the r semi-finals. Playing out the dead frames, Mountjoy produced the evening session’s third ton, a 124.
Semi-Finals
David Taylor beat Alex Higgins 9-5
Taylor’s remarkable consistency continued as Higgins, the championship’s second odds-on favourite, went out 5-9 after finding himself in a near impossible situation at the interval.
Then he was behind 1-7 and that was due to two reasons. Taylor was playing with ice cool accuracy as he took advantage of potting errors by the Irishman who, on the other hand, seemed unable to settle down until it was too late.
Certainly Taylor was the better under pressure and whenever there were loose reds around, he took them without looking for the spectacular shot which might produce the big break.
In fact Taylor’s whole attitude throughout the championships so far, proved this. At the end of his semi-final, he had played 41 frames and and made 20 breaks between 30 and 47.
Take what’s on and play safe, was Taylor’s theme and it wasn’t letting him down. He won the first frame on the black and as Higgins became a little edgy, took the next three to lead 4-0.
Higgins at last opened his account in the fifth but there was no stopping Taylor. At 47, his highest so far in the championship, in frame seven, made the score 6-1 and a 32 and 33 in the final frame of the afternoon, in which Higgins did not score, must have put him, in a very confident mood.
That evening began with Higgins winning the first two frames, showing for the only time his real sharpness around the black as breaks of 54 and 43 brought the tenth frame to an end in twelve minutes, 3-7.
“Could Higgins do it?” everyone was asking. The eleventh frame again went to Higgins and, if he could get to 5-7, the possibility of Taylor cracking under pressure could not be ruled out.
Taylor’s victory in the twelfth put an end to any thoughts of a Houdini act but it was desperately close. With the blue left, Higgins was five behind but in playing safety shots he twice went up and down the table to go in-off. In between Taylor had a flash at the colour, missed and landed safe.
He did, however, take a good blue and finished the frame off by rolling the pink down the side cushion. That frame had taken just over 27 minutes and the next was even longer, 42 minutes, 45 seconds as Higgins’s hopes still flickered.
The last frame took 28 minutes and could have gone either way, yet the opening which allowed Taylor to clinch the match was tragic for Higgins!
Taking the last red, he used the half butt to pot the brown, screwing across the table for the yellow. He didn’t quite get over far enough and had to use the short rest to clip in the yellow. Without the rest Higgins would have done so, but the yellow kicked on contact with the cue-ball and hit the top edge of the pocket, staying over the hole.
Yellow, green, brown, blue and pink! Taylor was in his first professional final after ten years of trying and no one could say he didn’t deserve to be there.
Doug Mountjoy beat Graham Miles 9-1
What a let-down for Miles. After his mammoth break in the quarter-final, he could hardly do a thing right and missed so many easy pots that he no doubt wished the ground would open up and swallow him.
He had arrived five minutes late at the venue and was liable to forfeit a frame. Mountjoy would not claim it, preferring to win his nine on the table and proceeded to win eight in a row.
Miles had been delayed by accidents on the M6 and if it was possible for him to settle down, he never had time to as Mountjoy kept up the pressure on him from the start. He had a break of 44 in the first frame, following that with 35 and 89 in the next.
As the semi-final reached the first interval Mountjoy popped in a 59 to make the score 4-0 and by halfway he made further breaks of 51 and 57 to lead 8-0. It was certainly killer snooker from the Welshman.
Miles really should have won the eighth frame but a dreadful miss on the yellow allowed Mountjoy to take it. Would Miles recover a little in the evening? His first shot suggested he might not as he broke off and went nearly in-off the pack.
Mountjoy then left him a red over the pocket. Miles potted it but missed another easy black. No, the twice Pot Black champion was not going to last much longer. While he won the frame, as Mountjoy overcut the pink, the Welshman ran out with a 40 in the tenth to wrap it up in double quick time.
The Final
Doug Mountjoy beat David Taylor 15-9
Taylor, as he had in all the other rounds, won the opening frame though it was not a particularly good one as both players showed glimpses of nerve problems.
Mountjoy soon drew level for a mistake by Taylor as he tried to cut a green into the middle pocket proved costly. His rival made 42 off it and the second frame, followed by the third in which he made a break of 46 out the Welshman in front.
Both players made mistakes in the fourth frame which went to Taylor who then put together his highest break of the championships, a 60, to win the next. At the first interval the score was 3-3, Mountjoy answering Taylor’s 40 to sweep up with a 43.
From 3-3, the Pot Black champion went to 5-3 but Taylor had a great run of four successive frame wins to turn the score round at 7-5 in his favour.
On the last day, Taylor was to collapse in a dramatic fashion, though of the first six frames, of which Mountjoy won five, at least two others could have gone either way. Both players were again affected by nerves and mistakes were frequent as Mountjoy took the first frame.
The Welshman had breaks of 37 and 50 to win the next but a black ball game in the 17th had Taylor pulling back to 8-9.
More scrappy frames saw Mountjoy take the initiative as Taylor, more than once failed to take advantage of winning situations.
With nine frames left, Mountjoy led 12-8 but in the first of the evening session Taylor reduced the margin to 9-12 with a break of 36.
However Taylor’s challenge was now over. Mountjoy had a modest 37 to win frame 22 and settled down to clinch the £3,500 first prize quite magnificently. A break of 63 took him to within one frame of victory and with television itching for a glorious finale, the Welshman provided it.
Taylor had taken the first red when Mountjoy seized on his chance. When he had finished, there wasn’t another ball on the table as a 120 clearance brought the house down.
The championships could not have finished on a better note. Taylor had fought bravely, but when it mattered most Mountjoy had the attacking flair to beat him.
Summary
In a tournament that would be blazed with Mountjoy’s two victories, Doug made this tournament his and produced snooker that was fearless and blistering. Wales has produced so many great players over the years and Doug was at the top of the list, not afraid to take on any player and accepting trophies in his quiet and comical manner.
