Ricky Walden
 Ricky Walden at the 2008 Paul Hunter Classic |
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| Born | 11 November 1982 Chester |
|---|---|
| Sport country |  England |
| Nickname | Stamina Man[1] |
| Professional | 2000– |
| Highest ranking | 15 (5 months) |
| Current ranking | 17 |
| Career winnings | UK£227,760[2] |
| Highest break | 147 – PTC 10 2011 |
| Century breaks | 101 |
| Tournament wins | |
| Ranking | 1 |
| Non-ranking | 1 |
Ricky Walden is a snooker professional, born in Chester, England but living in Flintshire, Wales.
He is currently ranked 18th in the world. He won the 2008 Shanghai Masters, his first ranking final, having previously reached one further ranking quarter-final.[3] He has spent four seasons in the top 48 of the rankings. His first appearance at the final stages of the World Championship came in 2009[4]
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[edit] Early years
He was one of the Young Players of Distinction in a scheme run in 2000, designed to help young players develop their playing and media skills, alongside Shaun Murphy, Stephen Maguire and Ali Carter. In 2001 he won the World Under-21 Championship.
[edit] Career
He started the 2004/2005 season ranked at #78 in the world, but climbed 30 places that year. He beat John Higgins twice that season, at the Grand Prix and UK Championship, and reached the Quarter-Final of the China Open.
In 2005/2006 his best run was to the last 16 in the China Open, which he achieved by beating Stephen Maguire. In 2006/2007 he had 2 last-32 appearance including the UK Championship, where he lost to Ronnie O'Sullivan 8–9. He lost to eventual finalist Mark Selby in qualifying for the World Championship.
He reached #36 for the 2007/2008 season and the same year he reached the last 16 of the Grand Prix, beating John Parrott in qualifying and four top-32 players in the main round-robin stage. He crashed out in the China Open to Mark Selby and in the qualifying for the World Championship, to Mark Allen.
In the 2008 Shanghai Masters he defeated Lee Spick and Ian McCulloch to qualify. At the venue he defeated wildcard Zhang Anda, Stephen Hendry, Neil Robertson (5–4, from 1–4 down), Steve Davis in the quarter-finals (5–2, from 0–2 down), and Mark Selby in the semi-final (6–4, from 1–4 down).[5] He won his first ranking title by beating Ronnie O'Sullivan 10–8 in the final.[6] The rest of the season was solid rather than spectacular, but a qualifying victory over Anthony Hamilton earned him a first appearance at the Crucible Theatre, where he lost 6–10 to Mark Selby.
In 2008 he also won the Sangsom 6-Reds Snooker International, beating Stuart Bingham 8–3 in the final.[7]
Walden made it to the World Championship for the second time in 2011 as a seeded player, but was beaten by qualifier Rory McLeod 10–6. After the match, Walden criticised McLeod for what he considered to be a slow and 'boring' style of play, although Walden was only marginally quicker than McLeod. McLeod responded to the criticism by arguing that Walden was more responsible for the pace of the match.[8]
Walden produced a maximum break during Players Tour Championship 2011/2012 – Event 10, the second 147 of the event.[9] He would later finish fifteenth in the PTC Order of Merit to qualify for the 2012 Finals.[10]
He qualified for the UK Championships by defeating Jamie Jones 6-2 in the fourth round. In the main draw he beat Stephen Lee, Mark Williams and Shaun Murphy all by 6-3 scorelines to set up a semi-final meeting with Mark Allen.[11] After the first session of the best-of 17-frames match Walden held a 5-3 advantage. However, upon resumption in the evening he lost the opening four frames and would eventually lose the match 7-9.[12] This was Walden's first semi-final in a ranking event based in Britain.
