Mike Russell (born 3 June 1969) is an English player of

English billiards English billiards, called simply billiards in the UK and in many former British colonies, is a cue sport that combines the aspects of carom billiards and pool. Two (one white and one yellow) and a red are used. Each player or team uses a diffe ...

. He is twelve-time WPBSA World Champion and has six

IBSF World Billiards Championship The IBSF World Billiards Championship (previously known as the World Amateur Billiards Championship) is the premier, international, non-professional tournament for the game of English billiards. Dating to some form to 1951, the event has been san ...

titles. He has been described as an "archrival" of

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

's prodigy,

Geet Sethi Geet Siriram Sethi (born 17 April 1961) of India is a professional player of English billiards who dominated the sport throughout much of the 1990s. He is also a notable amateur (ex-pro) snooker player. He is a five-time winner of the professi ...

, an eight-time World Champion, and each of them had defeated the other for the title, with Russell victorious in 1996, and Sethi the winner in 1998, as of their next encounter at the 2007 event. Both scored two apiece, but Russell knocked Sethi out in the semi-finals, 1835–1231, (65.5 vs. 45.6 average). Russell went on to win the title for the ninth time and a £6,000 prize, solidly beating Chris Shutt, 2166–1710 (52.8 vs. 42.8 avg.), with four double ''and'' four triple centuries to Shutt's four and none, respectively. At the IBSF World Billiards Championships 2010, Russell not only claimed the 150up- and time-format title, recorded a break of 1137 points in the time-format final. Even though the amateur rules applied in this tournament do not include the "Baulk line rule" used in professional events, he is only the fourth player ever to score a break of over 1000 in an official match under modern rules.

References

External links

Mike Russell bio at BillardsForum

Article by

John Inverdale John Ballantyne Inverdale (born 27 September 1957) is an English broadcaster who works for both the BBC and ITV. During his radio career, he has presented coverage of many major sporting events including the Olympic Games, Wimbledon, the Gran ...

in Daily Telegraph, 1 August 2007 1969 births English players of English billiards Living people British emigrants to Qatar World champions in English billiards Sportspeople from Middlesbrough {{billiards-bio-stub