The 2020 Q School was a series of three

snooker Snooker (pronounced , ) is a cue sport played on a rectangular Billiard table#Snooker and English billiards tables, billiards table covered with a green cloth called baize, with six Billiard table#Pockets 2, pockets: one at each corner and ...

tournaments held at the start of the

2020–21 snooker season The 2020–21 snooker season was a professional snooker season with tournaments played from 13 September 2020 to 9 May 2021. As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the season was played almost entirely without a live audience with only the 2021 W ...

. An event for amateur players, it served as a qualification event for a place on the professional

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 following two seasons. The events took place in August 2020 at the

English Institute of Sport The UK Sports Institute,https://uksportsinstitute.co.uk/who-we-are/uk-sports-institute/ previously known as the English Institute of Sport (EIS), established in May 2002, is an organisation which provides sport science and medical support servi ...

Sheffield Sheffield is a city in South Yorkshire, England, situated south of Leeds and east of Manchester. The city is the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire and some of its so ...

, England with a total 12 players qualifying via the three tournaments.

Format

Originally planned for June 2020, the series was delayed until August because of the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

. The 2020 Q School still consisted of three events but, rather than taking place one after the other, they were all played in a week. All first and second matches for all three events were played on the opening four days, and then the final stages were played on the next three days. The three events had 172 entries competing for 12 places on the main tour. Four players qualified from each of the three events. Rounds 1 and 2 were contested over 5 frames, with later rounds being played over seven frames.

Event 1

The first 2020 Q School event was held from 3 to 7 August 2020 at the

, England.

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 ...

, Peter Devlin,

Simon Lichtenberg Simon Lichtenberg (born 15 December 1997) is a German former professional snooker player. Career From Berlin, the son of British-German parents, Lichtenberg captained the league team of the Snookerfabrik (snooker factory) in Berlin. He was the ...

and

Fan Zhengyi Fan Zhengyi (; born 27 January 2001) is a Chinese professional snooker player. He won the IBSF World Under-21 Snooker Championship in 2017, and turned professional in 2018. He had a breakthrough season in 2021–22 when he reached his first ra ...

qualified. The results of the four final matches are given below. * 4–1 * 4–2 * 4–1 * 4–2

Event 2

The second 2020 Q School event was held from 4 to 8 August 2020 at the

, England. Jamie Jones,

Zak Surety Zak Surety (born 4 October 1991) is an English professional snooker player. He practises frequently with Stuart Bingham and Allan Taylor. Career As an amateur, Surety based in Basildon entered in Players Tour Championship events from their e ...

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 ...

and

Ben Hancorn Ben Hancorn (born 24 May 1982) is an English former professional snooker player. He played on the World Snooker Tour from 2020 to 2022. In 2023, he was a semi-finalist of the World Seniors Snooker Championship. Career In 2008, Hancorn was the r ...

qualified. The results of the four final matches are given below. * 4–0 * 4–1 * 4–2 * 4–0

Event 3

The third 2020 Q School event was held from 5 to 9 August 2020 at the

, England. Rory McLeod, Jamie Wilson,

Farakh Ajaib Farakh Ajaib (born 3 February 1991) is a British Pakistani professional snooker player from Lancashire. Career In 2018, Ajaib was crowned the inaugural East Lancashire Snooker Championship winner. He was a ‘top-up’ player for several main t ...

and

Steven Hallworth Steven Hallworth (born 1 December 1995) is an English professional snooker player. He is the only ever qualified professional from Lincoln. He is a practice partner of Stuart Carrington. Career Junior Hallworth started playing snooker aged ...

qualified. The results of the four final matches are given below. * 4–2 * 4–3 * 4–2 * 4–2

Q School Order of Merit

A Q School Order of Merit was produced for players who failed to gain a place on the main tour. The Order of Merit was used to top up fields for the

where an event failed to attract the required number of entries. The rankings in the Order of Merit were based on the number of frames won in the three Q School events. Players who received a bye into the second round were awarded three points for round one. Where players were equal, those who won the most frames in the first event were ranked higher and, if still equal, the player with most frames in event two. The Order of Merit was intended to be used to give priority places for the new

Q Tour The Q Tour, officially the WPBSA Q Tour, is a second-tier series of snooker tournaments immediately below the level of the World Snooker Tour, consisting of amateur and ex-professional players to compete for qualifying places to the main tour. It ...

which was announced in July 2020. However the tour was delayed by a year and only started in 2021–22. The leading players in the Q School Order of Merit are given below.

Two-season performance of qualifiers

The following table shows the rankings of the 12 qualifiers from the 2020 Q School, at the end of the

2021–22 snooker season The 2021–22 snooker season was a series of snooker tournaments played from July 2021 to May 2022, including the professional World Snooker Tour but also featuring events for female, senior, and Q School players. The season saw a record five ...

, the end of their two guaranteed seasons on the tour, together with their tour status for the

2022–23 snooker season The 2022–23 snooker season was a series of snooker tournaments played from June 2022 to May 2023. Players The World Snooker Tour in the 2022–23 season initially consisted of a field of 131 professional players, but later dropped to 130 w ...

. Players in the top-64 of the rankings retained their place on the tour while those outside the top-64 lost their place unless they qualified under a different category.

References

{{2020–21 snooker season Q School (snooker) 2020 in English sport 2020 in snooker Sports competitions in Sheffield