By Elliott West
“It’s the happiest day of my life. It’s a fantastic feeling to be world champion and just makes me think how wrong I was to pack in the game for three years. In the past I have had no self-belief – this win changes all that”.
Neil Moseley
Introduction
Neil Moseley made the headlines in 1992 when he inflicted a massive defeat on Leonardo Andam from the Philippines. The 11-2 victory over his unseeded opponent of course occurred at the Lowenbrau IBSF World Amateur Championship, held at the New Dolmen Hotel in Bugibba, Malta. Mosley who had previously packed up snooker for three years, became the first English winner of the title since Jimmy White won this prestigious title in 1980.
The Final
Then 23, Neil from Peterlee in County Durham had never been in a major final and the daunting prospect of bright lights and television cameras tracking all your moves, could have easily have sent this young prospect over the edge but surprisingly throughout the competition and especially in the final, he was undeterred and definitely not phased. Yet so was the case for his opponent, who produced a string of wins to reach this final showdown and had left Moseley more determined to dispatch this annoying thorn in his side.
Moseley, the No.2 seed at the time, got off to a flying start in the first session, producing an impressive 120 break which helped him set up a 4-1 lead over his opponent. However, Andam didn’t panic and took frame six to reduce his overnight deficit to two frames.
Leonardo, who had previously been a pool player for twenty years, had only recently started playing snooker, picking up a cue a few years ago after literally being self-taught, spending hours watching a Terry Griffiths’ video. Perhaps this showed when he arrived at the venue for the second session minus a tie and proceedings were delayed for ten minutes while he tried to find a replacement.
Andam changed his tactics when play resumed and instead went on the defensive. A strategy that ultimately cast a dark shadow over his play with Moseley winning all six frames of the second session to lead 10-2. This was the beginning of the end for the Filipino. When he walked out In front of a packed Maltese audience, the spectacle became too much for him and his opponent knocked in breaks of 49, 70 and 57 and at night he needed just fifteen minutes to claim the World Amateur Championship title.
