Fergal OBrien - Flashes OBrilliance

Late last month, Fergal O’Brien returned for his second appearance in Hiney’s Upper Deck, Crossmolina, to take on five local players and for the much anticipated exhibition rematch with Jason Devaney.

This year, the exhibition was refereed by one of the men who saw the talent in Devaney and did his best to help Jason realise that potential, Ballina’s Mark Winters.

A little over a year ago, Jason defeated Fergal 2-1 in Crossmolina and although it wasn’t a competitive match, it’s a nice feather in the cap of any amateur player to defeat a professional – let alone the Irish no. 1.

While Fergal is of course delighted to be back at no.1, he is quick to admit he’d take being in the top 16 over being no. 1 in Ireland any day of the week.

“There’s very little point in being the top player in Ireland if you’re only ranked 40 in the world. I’d much rather, and am sure most players would feel the same, to be in the top 16 than be number 1 in Ireland. When I first started there were many players ahead of me in the Irish rankings such as Eugene Hughes and for most of my career Ken’s been number one in Ireland so it is, naturally, nice to be at number one for the first time in my career.”

Over the course of 9 frames, Fergal knocked in 10 breaks over 50. Two had him on the way to a maximum – 56 (8 reds and 8 blacks) and a 57 (9 reds and 8 blacks) and one break ended agonising on 91. Disappointed? he was asked.

“I wouldn’t say disappointed, as such. It would have been nice to make a century. I’ve actually only had 4 exhibitions in my entire career where I’ve failed to make a century and two of them were in Crossmolina. The Crossmolina exhibitions have both been just after I’ve got back into practising so I wasn’t expecting a lot. I put on the best performance I could,” – to expect anything more would be ridiculous.

To give the local players an even greater incentive, Fergal elected to give the five players from the Deel Rovers S.C. a 40-point advantage in the one frame encounters. Although, Fergal did alleviate the 40-point deficits in relative ease, more often than not, opening with a 50+ break, he was delighted to see a strong interest in the sport remaining in Mayo.

“It’s always nice to give some local players a match and it’s nice to see them get in and pot a few balls. I also enjoyed getting the chance to practice with Jason when I was in Crossmolina last year and pass on any advice I could.”

Last year, when Fergal spoke to this reporter he stated “I didn’t have the junior successes of players like Jason [Devaney] and Davey [Morris] and those players have the world at their feet”, he echoed those same sentiments even though he beat Jason 4-0 in this year’s contest.

“Jason talents can’t be judged on the merits of one performance, neither can a professionals for that matter, when I play an amateur player I’m expected to win, when players on the Pro circuit play Juniors, the professionals are expected to win, when Juniors play local players in their clubs, the Juniors are expected to win. Jason’s just come off studying hard for his Leaving Certificate so he wouldn’t have had the amount of time to practice he would have liked. I beat David Morris 5-0 in the Lucan Racing Irish Snooker Classic and even though David’s on the Pro. Tour now and I would have been expected to beat him, we were all out of practice and snooker’s a funny game, things can go either way on any given day.”

A gentleman – certainly, as anyone who’s had the fortune of speaking to him will attest to, a scholar - possibly not. “I wasn’t the most dedicated student; I remember writing in my homework journal, once, that I wanted to become a professional snooker player.” Fergal admitted.

While good snooker ability has unfairly often been accredited to a misspent youth, many players, nowadays, do alternate their time between cueing-action and academia. Ding Junhui, for one, recently finished a college degree before competing in the World Championships. Ballina’s Jason, sponsored by World of Wonder, clearly has a mature head on his shoulders, as he didn’t let his snooker ambitions get in the way of focusing on school – a message many professionals would send out to any young player, in any sport, with dreams of becoming a professional – even still, he has achieved more than most on the under-age circuit.

After two matches against the two-time Western People Sports Star award winner, Jason, the scores are tied at 1 match apiece. So will Fergal be back for the decided?

“I’d like to be, I hope we can make this an annual event and we’ve even looked at bringing some other names from the Professional tour over, such as Jimmy White or Ken Doherty but that’s in the early stages of discussion. I’m sure I’ll be back to play Jason again and hopefully the exhibitions in Crossmolina will continue for a few more years.”

While there is a gulf in talent between the amateur tour and that of the professionals, Fergal was quick to concede that his career before tourning professional doesn’t measure up to the Ballina native’s.

“I didn’t have the greatest amateur career; I was winning local tournaments and was good but didn’t have the same victories as players like Jason. All you have to do is take a look at his accolades; he’s U-19 and U-21 National champion,” Considering he has a few years left at both age levels and is representing Ireland at European and World events, just adds to the commendable achievements of the young cueist.

 Ken Doherty even once commented, after seeing Jason play just a few shots in the Royal Theatre, Castlebar, “Who knows? Perhaps Ballina will have a World Snooker Champion of its own, one day,”

Although, as has often been said, the only thing certain in this world is uncertainty, it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that Jason could one day reach the pinnacle of his chosen sport and most who have seen the flame-haired snooker starlet in action, including Fergal, believe that they’ve witnessed a star in the making. He’s won two Stars of the Future snooker competitions in one weekend and is definitely a star shining bright.