Rhys Clark (born 17 August 1994) is a former

Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...

professional snooker player.

Career

Amateur

From the village of Stonehouse,

South Lanarkshire South Lanarkshire (; ) is one of 32 unitary authorities of Scotland. It borders the south-east of the Glasgow City council area and contains some of Greater Glasgow's suburban towns, as well as many rural towns and villages. It also shares bor ...

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

, Clark started playing snooker from aged 11. As an amateur he featured in various professional tournaments with his best results coming in the

2014 World Snooker Championship The 2014 World Snooker Championship (officially the 2014 Dafabet World Snooker Championship) was a professional snooker tournament that took place from 19 April to 5 May 2014 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. It was the 3 ...

first round qualifier where he beat Mike Dunn 10–2 and the

2015 Indian Open The 2015 Indian Open was a professional ranking snooker tournament that took place between 10 and 14 March 2015 at the Grand Hyatt in Mumbai, India. The tournament was originally scheduled for 13–17 October 2014, but was postponed until March ...

wildcard round where he beat former professional Pankaj Advani 4–3.

Professional

In the first event of the

2015 Q School The 2015 Q School was a series of two snooker tournaments held at the start of the 2015–16 snooker season. An event for amateur players, it served as a qualification event for a place on the professional World Snooker Tour for the following t ...

, Clark reached the final round and made breaks of 63 and 59 against

Leo Fernandez Leo Fernandez (born 5 July 1976 in Limerick) is an Irish former professional snooker player. Snooker career Fernandez's best ranking event progress was reaching the last 16 of the 2003 Welsh Open, defeating opponents including fellow Irishman F ...

and won 4–1, a win which gave Clark a two-year card to the

World Snooker Tour The World Snooker Tour (WST) is the main professional snooker tour, consisting of about 128 players competing on a circuit of up to 28 tournaments each season. It is administered by World Snooker Ltd, the commercial arm of professional snooker, ...

for the 2015–16 season and 2016–17 seasons. He won his first match by beating Grant Miles 5–1 in the 2015 Australian Goldfields Open qualifiers, before losing by a reverse of this scoreline to Li Hang. At the

UK Championship The UK Championship is a professional ranking snooker tournament. It is one of snooker's prestigious Triple Crown events, along with the World Championship and the Masters. It is usually held at the Barbican in York, England. Ronnie O'Sull ...

he was knocked out in the first round 1–6 by Mark Davis. A 5–0 whitewash over

Ken Doherty Kenneth Joseph Doherty (born 17 September 1969) is an Irish professional snooker player who also works as a commentator and pundit on televised snooker broadcasts. From Ranelagh in Dublin, he is the sport's only World Snooker Championship, wor ...

with a high break of 104 saw Clark qualify for the China Open. In Clark's first appearance at a Chinese ranking event he won a match at a venue for the first time by beating Davis 5–4. In the next round Clark made breaks over 50 in each of the four frames he won, but was edged out 4–5 by

Alfie Burden Alfred Burden (born 14 December 1976) is an English former professional snooker player from London. He first turned professional in 1994 and reached his highest world ranking of 38th in the 2001–02 and 2002–03 seasons. His best results in ...

. His first season as a professional ended with an opening round 5–10 defeat to David Gilbert in

World Championship A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game ...

qualifying. Clark received a bye to the second round of the 2016 English Open and then eliminated

Lee Walker Lee Walker (born 11 February 1976) is a Welsh retired professional snooker player and former World Seniors Champion. He is an official WPBSA coach and is the long-term coach of Mark Williams. Career After turning professional in 1994 at the ag ...

4–2 and

Kyren Wilson Kyren James Wilson (; born 23 December 1991) is an English professional snooker player from Kettering. He has won 10 ranking titles. Wilson made his professional tour debut in the 2010–11 snooker season, 2010–11 season after finishing fif ...

4–3 (finished the match with 50 plus breaks in five successive frames) to advance to the last 16 of a ranking event for the first time and he lost 1–4 to

Stuart Bingham Stuart Bingham (born 21 May 1976) is an English professional snooker player who is a former World Champion and Masters winner. Bingham won the 1996 World Amateur Championship but enjoyed little sustained success in the early part of his pro ...

. Clark earned a second round televised match with

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 ...

at the

after squeezing past Li Hang 6–5, but was whitewashed 0–6. He knocked out Sean O'Sullivan 4–1 and

Mitchell Mann Mitchell Dennis Mann (born 26 December 1991) is an English professional snooker player. Career Junior Mann first played snooker aged 9, after being forced to quit football after a diagnosis of Legg–Calvé–Perthes syndrome, a rare disease ...

at the

Gibraltar Open The Gibraltar Open was a Snooker world rankings, ranking snooker tournament. In 2015 it was part of the Players Tour Championship. The tournament started in 2015 and was staged at the Europa Point Sports Complex in Gibraltar. Robert Milkins was ...

, before losing 2–4 to

Neil Robertson Neil Alexander Robertson (born 11 February 1982) is an Australian professional snooker player, who is a former List of World Snooker Championship winners, world champion and former List of world number one snooker players, world number one. He ...

Clark ended the season 75th in the world rankings, but has earned a new two-year tour card through the one-year ranking list.

Performance and rankings timeline

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Clark, Rhys 1994 births People from Stonehouse, South Lanarkshire Living people Scottish snooker players Sportspeople from South Lanarkshire