News Mania Desk/ Sohom Chatterjee / 7th September 2024
Matthew Selt, a professional snooker player from UK recently participated in a major tournament in Saudi Arabia. However, during his transit via flight, his trusted cue of 10 years broke due to the carelessness of the baggage handlers.
The 33rd world rank player said that when he landed at Riyadh, his carrying case was already “clearly deformed”. And later he discovered that his cue was “completely broken” and snapped in half towards the base.
Selt, with help of his coach Chris Henry, found a local carpenter in the gulf country who was able to glue the cue together prior to his opening tie on September 1.
Speaking to BBC, the Englishman said, “It sounds ridiculous but it was an incredible turn of events.”
There were still the persistent fear of the cue breaking, but Selt managed to proceed to fourth round of the competition before exiting with the prize of £11,000.
Selt said, “The cue played very similar to how it did before it broke, albeit with a crack all the way through it.”
While asked about why he chose to go with his old broken cue rather than opting for a new one, he had to say, “Because every piece of wood has different characteristics, it’s quite hard to get used to a new one straight away – it’s not ideal.”
“I’ve been playing with this one for 10 years, I know exactly what it’s going to do and all the characteristics to deal with the dimensions.”
“It sounds a little bit geeky, but [using a new cue] would be like starting again.”
