Stephen Hendry player profile
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Stephen Hendry in WST Pro Series Draw

The Scot hasn’t played since announcing his comeback at the beginning of the season.

The draw for the inaugural WST Pro Series was released on Friday with seven-time world champion Stephen Hendry among those set to feature.

Hendry is in Group G alongside Gary Wilson, Lu Ning, Martin O’Donnell, Liam Highfield, Jamie O’Neill, Zhao Jianbo, and Rory McLeod.

The schedule hasn’t been released yet, but it could mark the first time Hendry competes on the Main Tour since his first retirement in 2012.

A new tournament on the calendar to help fill the void left by the cancelled Chinese events, the WST Pro Series follows a similar format to that utilised in the Championship League earlier this term when the latter was temporarily staged as a ranking event.

There are 16 groups comprising eight players in each, with a round-robin phase determining the top two who will advance to the second group stage.

Eight groups in the first stage take place after the Masters is completed towards the end of January, while the remaining eight groups are in March.

The 32 players who progress to stage two will be split into four more groups of eight, with the top two again moving forward from each to contest the final group.

Former world number one Hendry shocked and excited many fans last September with the announcement that he was going to attempt a return to the professional game.

However, the 51 year-old didn’t enter any tournaments at the end of 2020 as he instead maintained his focus on getting his standard up to an acceptable level from practice.

Hendry teamed up with renowned coach Stephen Feeney from SightRight last year, a move which paved the way for his unexpected comeback.

As well as participating in the WST Pro Series, Hendry has also indicated recently his intention to play in the upcoming Welsh Open in February.

Judd Trump, Ronnie O’Sullivan, Mark Selby, and Shaun Murphy are among several high-profile figures also in the WST Pro Series draw.

Neil Robertson, Ding Junhui, and John Higgins are notable absentees in an event in which matches are only the best of three frames in length.

One other interesting aspect of the draw is in Group J, with father and son duo Peter and Oliver Lines set to play each other on the Main Tour for the first time.

WST Pro Series Draw

Group A
Shaun Murphy
Michael Holt
Alan McManus
Louis Heathcote
Xu Si
Ken Doherty
Fraser Patrick
Brian Ochoiski

Group B
Kyren Wilson
Li Hang
Yuan Sijun
Sunny Akani
Pang Junxu
Kacper Filipiak
Aaron Hill
Fan Zhengyi

Group C
Stuart Bingham
Scott Donaldson
Sam Craigie
Chris Wakelin
Jamie Clarke
Ashley Carty
Billy Castle
Jamie Curtis-Barrett

Group D
Barry Hawkins
Ricky Walden
Jimmy Robertson
Alexander Ursenbacher
Gerard Greene
Duane Jones
Farakh Ajaib
Paul Davison

Group E
Mark Selby
Matthew Selt
Joe O’Connor
Stuart Carrington
Eden Sharav
Soheil Vahedi
Lukas Kleckers
Daniel Womersley

Group F
Mark Allen
Ben Woollaston
Noppon Saengkham
David Grace
Igor Figueiredo
Jordan Brown
Riley Parsons
Fergal O’Brien

Group G
Gary Wilson
Lu Ning
Martin O’Donnell
Liam Highfield
Jamie O’Neill
Zhao Jianbo
Rory McLeod
Stephen Hendry

Group H
Yan Bingtao
Ali Carter
Mark Davis
Tian Pengfei
Chang Bingyu
Simon Lichtenberg
Amine Amiri
Kuldesh Johal

Group I
Ronnie O’Sullivan
Tom Ford
Lyu Hoatian
Mark Joyce
Chen Zifan
David Lilley
Ben Hancorn
Jamie Wilson

Group J
David Gilbert
Martin Gould
Elliot Slessor
Ian Burns
James Cahill
Peter Lines
Oliver Lines
Iulian Boiko

Group K
Anthony McGill
Zhao Xintong
Mark King
Dominic Dale
Andy Hicks
Si Jiahui
Peter Devlin
Lee Walker

Group L
Thepchaiya Un-Nooh
Zhou Yuelong
Anthony Hamilton
Luo Honghao
Mitchell Mann
Lei Peifan
Ashley Hugill
Leo Fernandez

Group M
Joe Perry
Xiao Guodong
Matthew Stevens
Daniel Wells
Jak Jones
Rod Lawler
Allan Taylor
Haydon Pinhey

Group N
Jack Lisowski
Graeme Dott
Luca Brecel
Andrew Higginson
Jackson Page
Brandon Sargeant
Zak Surety
Michael White

Group O
Judd Trump
Hossein Vafaei
Ryan Day
Jamie Jones
Barry Pinches
Jimmy White
Steven Hallworth
Sean Maddocks

Group P
Mark Williams
Kurt Maflin
Robert Milkins
Nigel Bond
Robbie Williams
Gao Yang
Alex Borg
Oliver Brown

Featured photo credit: WSS

One Comment

  1. I predict mayhem! Playing 28 best-of-3 matches over 2 tables in a single day… Actually Stephen Hendry’s group doesn’t contain the most interesting players, so you may be forced to write about a dull day. It will be nice for Zhao Jianbo, who was only 8 when Hendry retired, although he may have met the great man during his visits to academies in Guangzhou or Beijing.

    Oh, and you (or WST) misspelled the name of my favourite player, not for the first time.

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