Kacper Filipiak (born 19 November 1995) is a Polish retired professional snooker player. He turned professional in 2011 after winning the European Under-21 Championship, and became Poland's first player on snooker's professional Main Tour. He was the first Polish player to make a 147 in competitive competition, doing so in a PLS Top 16 match against Marcin Nitschke. He was also a professional player from 2019 to 2021, having qualified by winning the 2019

EBSA European Snooker Championship The EBSA European Snooker Championship is the premier amateur snooker tournament in Europe. The event series is sanctioned by the European Billiards and Snooker Association. It first took place in 1988 and has been held annually since 1993. In most ...

Career

Debut season

The 2011/2012 snooker season was Filipiak's first as a professional. At the age of 15 he became the youngest professional player. Filipiak performed impressively at the Snooker World Cup, beating the likes of

John Higgins John Higgins (born 18 May 1975) is a Scottish professional snooker player from Wishaw in North Lanarkshire. Since turning professional in 1992, he has won 33 ranking titles, placing him in third position on the List of snooker players by num ...

Stephen Maguire Stephen Maguire (born 13 March 1981) is a Scottish professional snooker player. He has won six major ranking tournaments, including the 2004 UK Championship, and has twice since reached the finals of that event. Maguire turned professional in ...

and

Marco Fu Marco Fu Ka-chun (; born 8 January 1978) is a Hong Kong professional snooker player. He is a three-time snooker world rankings, ranking event winner, having won the 2007 Grand Prix (snooker), 2007 Grand Prix, the 2013 Australian Goldfie ...

in the singles matches; this led to him being tipped as a future world champion by

Ronnie O'Sullivan Ronald Antonio O'Sullivan (born 5 December 1975) is an English professional snooker player. Widely recognised as one of the most talented and accomplished players in snooker history, he has won the World Snooker Championship seven times, a m ...

. However, his results in the ranking tournaments were disappointing: he entered five of the eight ranking events, but failed to win a single match, picking just four frames during the season. Filipiak also had a poor set of results in the PTC events throughout the season, as he played in 10 of the 12 tournaments but did not win a match. He finished the year ranked world number 86, out of the top 64 who retained their places for the 2012/2013 season. Filipiak entered Q School in a bid to win a place for the upcoming season and played in all three events without picking up a single victory and dropped off the main snooker tour.

Amateur years

Filipiak could only enter

Players Tour Championship The Players Tour Championship was a series of snooker tournaments comprising some minor-ranking events played in Europe, and an Asian leg comprising some minor-ranking events in Asia. The series concluded with a Players Championship Grand Final, ...

events the 2012/2013 season. He played in five, but could only qualify for the first round in three, losing his match once there in all of them. He entered Q School in 2014 but was unable to win enough matches to earn a main tour card. He played in three of the six

European Tour The European Tour, currently titled as the DP World Tour for sponsorship reasons, and legally the PGA European Tour or the European Tour Group, is the leading men's professional golf tour in Europe. The organisation also operates the European ...

events in the 2014/2015 season with his only win coming at the

Gdynia Open The Gdynia Open was a pro–am minor-Snooker world rankings, ranking snooker tournament, which was part of the Players Tour Championship. The tournament in the Snooker season 2012/2013, 2012/2013 was split in two parts, with the first part takin ...

, where he beat

Gerard Greene Gerard Eamonn Greene (born 12 November 1973 in Chatham, Kent) is a Northern Irish former professional snooker player. He represents Northern Ireland in international events, as his parents are from Belfast. Greene has enjoyed moderate success ...

4–2, before falling 4–0 to

Oliver Lines Oliver Lines (born 16 June 1995) is an English professional snooker player who practices at Northern Snooker Centre in Leeds. He is the son of former professional snooker player Peter Lines. Career Amateur Lines switched sports from football ...

in the second round. He once again had an unsuccessful Q School. Filipiak lost in the quarter-finals of the 2015 IBSF World Under-21 Snooker Championship 6–5 to

Josh Boileau Josh Boileau (born 2 July 1995 in Newbridge, County Kildare) is an Irish former professional snooker player. He is the 2016 Under-21 European Snooker Champion. Career In 2014, Boileau entered the EBSA European Under-21 Snooker Championships i ...

. After beating

4–3 at the

, Filipiak made his televised debut in the second round against

Andrew Higginson Andrew Higginson (born 13 December 1977) is an English professional snooker player from Widnes, Cheshire. He is best known for being the surprise finalist of the 2007 Welsh Open (snooker), 2007 Welsh Open. Career Early years After some succ ...

and lost 4–3. He won the 2019

. He therefore gained a two-year professional tour card to return to the tour for the 2019/2020 and 2020/2021 seasons. At the end of the 2020/2021 season, Filipiak was ranked 86th, and therefore lost his place on the tour. He announced his retirement from professional snooker following a 6-3 defeat to

Zhao Xintong Zhao Xintong (; born 3 April 1997) is a Chinese professional snooker player and the reigning World Snooker Champion. He first turned professional in the 2016–17 season, aged 19, having previously recorded wins against a number of top p ...

during the third qualifying round of the

2021 World Snooker Championship The 2021 World Snooker Championship (officially the 2021 Betfred World Snooker Championship) was a professional snooker tournament that took place from 17 April to 3 May 2021 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. It was the 4 ...

Performance and rankings timeline

Career finals

Amateur finals: 8 (4 titles)

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Filipiak, Kacper 1995 births Living people Polish snooker players Sportspeople from Warsaw