By Elliott West
Introduction
Held between the 18th and 26th October, 1986 at the iconic Hexagon Theatre in Reading, the Grand Prix was made up of many the well known players of the era. In a draw that opened with the last 64 players, whittled down from 118, many of the greats had been dispatched by the last 16 stage. This was a tournament that seemed likely to produce a winner from one of the favourites but was memorable because Rex Williams reached his only professional final since first turning professional in 1951.
The Tournament
The Semi-Finals
By the time this event reached the semi-final stage, only Neal Foulds, Silvino Francisco, Jimmy White and Rex Williams were left in the competition. Silvino had previously beaten Tony Knowles 5-2 in the quarter-final and Jimmy White had defeated Stephen Hendry in a close match 5-4. In the other half of the draw, Neal Foulds had beaten Tony Meo 5-3 and Rex Williams produced some magical snooker to dispatch the titan of the time, Steve Davis and crushed his opponent 5-1.
In the semi- finals, Silvino Francisco played Jimmy White. A match that started with a blistering, opening frame from Jimmy. The Londoner made a 138 total clearance, setting a tournament record and attained his highest break of his professional career. Not a bad start to this battle between England and South Africa. White then took the second frame 59-57 with a highest break of 33. Despite this White surge, Francisco fought back and stopped the rot by taking the third frame, flying through with Jimmy only able to accrue four points, whilst his opponent made a break of 77 and sealed it with a score line of 4-81.
The South African did well to win the remaining two frames of the afternoon, both from behind but his failure to clinch winning chances in the first two frames of the evening session, put him 3-6 down and left Silvino with much to think about. Instead of springing into action, Francisco was definitely laboured on the shot, feathering as many as 25 times when he would usually only use half that number. Perhaps this was to be sure of the shot but it instead had a detrimental effect, destroying his rhythm.
Silvino tried to pull the match back, reducing White’s lead to two frames but in a race where the ‘Whirlwind’ was definitely the strongest player, he never looked like he would be realistically caught. Despite this, this was Jimmy’s first win over the South African in four meetings and admitted his opponent was hard to play. Commenting after his 9-6 win, Jimmy remarked:
“He never seems to be in position but he seems to keep potting the balls and it’s a different type of game to when you play somebody with better control. He’s a hard man to beat”.
The other semi-final, produced a match was all nip and tuck with Neal Foulds making high breaks of 83, 75 and 73 and Rex Williams 92, 91, 69, 66 and 64. With a total of 1728 points made in the match with a 1034/694 points ratio between Williams and Foulds, the match ended in a deciding frame with Williams reeling off a string of frames. In the decider, Foulds was outplayed and Rex won the match comfortably 70-5.
The Final
In what was on paper an unlikely match-up, Jimmy White locked horns with a 53 year old Rex Williams, the oldest ever player to appear in a ranking final. Rex started the match with thwarting an attempt by Jimmy to lead the match. White led 2-1 with a 101 clearance but then the veteran kicked into gear and took a 5-2 lead, taking the fifth frame after trailing 4-40, the sixth after White had cancelled out all but two points of his 45 deficit and the seventh with a total clearance of 125 in which the black was potted only with the last shot.
However, in the evening session, Williams seemed to crumble and couldn’t retain the momentum that he had mainly in the afternoon session. Several crucial misses and a crucial fourteenth frame involving a tense safety exchange on the final black, led to Jimmy closing in 4-5 and then taking the lead 7-6 after winning three of the four frames. White then whipped through the remaining two frames and won the match convincingly 10-6. White commented after the match saying:
“Rex did start to fold a bit at the end, the last four frames he started missing anything half difficult “.
Rex Williams reflected on the match, saying:
“I missed a few but you couldn’t hide the ball anywhere to stop him potting”.
Summary
The 1986 Grand Prix was one of the greats of its period and produced a final that left a few people surprised. Rex Williams, a veteran of the sport by then, couldn’t have faced a more difficult opponent in Jimmy White. White was in his pomp and Rex had his chance to continue a domineering lead but perhaps the session change was his downfall. White sprung into action and killed off not only the lead but the match as well.
