By Elliott West
“If you can keep playing the balls, forget your opponent and forget about the products of winning, then you can be a winner”.
Dennis Taylor
Introduction
The 1984 Grand Prix was so memorable because it was the launchpad for Dennis Taylor. The Irishman hadn’t won a title for thirteen years and so became one those emotional dramas in the snooker annals. Dennis’s display of snooker throughout this tournament, was undoubtedly some of his best. Like a vintage wine, it just got better and better. A feat that was also memorable because Dennis had not so long lost his mother to cancer and was in the depths of a grieving process.
His 10-2 victory over his best friend off the table, Cliff Thorburn produced a handsome bounty of £45,000 and was a clear reward for sheer self-discipline in the event and ironically in time of tragedy, mental clarity prevails when presented with a life goal. A positive attitude prevailed and helped him savour the fruits of his labour. By winning this title meant that Taylor had not lost a match that season and with the vital seven ranking points attained from the first two ranking tournaments, left him only one point behind Steve Davis. A player who had won the Jameson tournament and the semi-final of the Rothmans.
The Tournament
Held at the Hexagon in Reading between the 20th October and the 28th October, 1984, the Grand Prix carried at the time, the highest first prize money in the history of snooker. The defending champion was Tony Knowles but Tony’s luck ran out in 1984 as he was only able to make it to the quarter-finals, beaten 5-2 by Neal Foulds. A disappointment for the lad from Bolton as he had a good run up to this point with 5-1 wins over Vic Harris and John Dunning and a 5-2 victory over Ian Williamson.
With Tony Knowles out of the equation, this left Neal Foulds, Steve Davis, Dennis Taylor, Cliff Thorburn in the semi-final stage. Steve Davis looked likely to proceed to another final but ended up by being edged out by the ‘Grinder’, Cliff Thorburn. In a close match, Cliff got the better of his opponent and sent the lad from Romford packing 9-7.
In the other semi-final, Neal Foulds was drawn against Dennis Taylor. Taylor was playing at the top of his game, made light work of Foulds and Neal was only able to eek out three frames from his opponent in a 9-3 win for the man from Coalisland. A resurgent Dennis, looked increasingly favourable for the title but he had one obstacle left to overcome and that lay in the hands of Cliff Thorburn.
In the final, Dennis played like a man possessed, reeling off eight frames in succession with a course that nearly followed a reversal of when Davis imposed a 9-0 drubbing of Taylor in the 1981 Jameson International. For all Thorburn’s renewed stamina, it may have been drained by his performance against Steve Davis the previous day. The Canadian managed to keep the match in check by bringing it back to 2-2 but beyond that point, Dennis was devastating.
Taylor’s last visit of the afternoon produced a 112 clearance and his first break of the evening was a break of 47. This meant that he had scored 208 points without reply. More important than this mere statistic, was the aggression he maintained when holding such a big lead. Earlier in his career, he might well have been more intent on defending it.
Thorburn had no chance to mount the counter attack which so often comes from the trailing player early in the session and two frames had gone by before Taylor had made any mistake of any account. Thorburn wasn’t able to reply and Dennis went on to make a 65 break which gave him a 9-2 lead. There was no answer to this and Taylor duly took the last frame to win the match 10-2.
Summary
This momentous win by Dennis Taylor, was the start of a seismic charge that resulted in the endgame of his 1985 World Championship victory. In his day, Dennis was one of the most devastating players when in form and was able to dissect his opponent with his powerful game. A master tactician, Taylor scored heavily when in the balls and his several classic victories in this period, were a powerful tribute to the memory of his late mother.
