Taylor wins Black Ball Final
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The 1985 World Snooker Championships at The Crucible Theatre, Sheffield, England, took place in April of that year.
The favourite was Steve Davis. He was a three time World Champion, in 1981, 1983 and 1984. He was the World Number 1, and had dominated snooker for the duration of the 1980s. It looked like he was nailed on to win his fourth World Championship.
He beat Neal Foulds 10-8 in the First Round, and then had a 13-4 win over David Taylor, and a 13-6 win over Terry Griffiths. He then thrashed a 52 year old 6 time World Champion Ray Reardon 16-5 in the Semi Finals to reach the Final.
Dennis Taylor had a similarly easy path. He beat Silvino Francisco 10-2, Eddie Charlton 13-6, Cliff Thorburn 13-5, and Tony Knowles 16-5 to set up a match against Davis. Taylor was the World Number 11, and had failed to win the World title. His previous World Final ended in defeat to Terry Griffiths in 1979. His glasses made him appeal to the fans, and was the fan favourite.
The Final got underway with Davis in inspired form. In the opening session, he dominated throughout, winning all the frames to lead 7-0. That evening, a further 9 frames were played. Davis went into an 8-0 lead, but missed a fairly easy blue to lead 9-0. Taylor pinched the frame to reduce his deficit to 8-1, and then found brilliant form to get to within two frames of Davis at 9-7 overnight.
On the second day, the players were more evenly matched. In the eight frames in the afternoon, Davis could not pull away from Taylor, with the lead remaining at two frames or so until Taylor won the last two of the session to level the scores at 12-12. The match would come down to the final session.
The final session again saw Davis fail to pull away. He had leads of 14-12 and 15-13, before Taylor again levelled at 15-15. Davis once again pulled to within one of victory at 17-15, before Taylor once more levelled the scores at 17-17. It would come down to the final frame.
The final frame saw both players playing badly. They were hugely nervous, and took a lot of time over their shots. With four colours remaining, Davis needed only one of them to win the title. But he left a long brown with a safety shot, which also knocked the black safe. Taylor potted the brown, but left himself an awkward cut on the blue. Taylor took it on and potted it, but now left himself tight on the cushion for the pink. He knocked in the pink though, and it came down to the final black.
The time was now quarter past midnight and the latest ever finish to a World Final. Taylor had declared that if he had a shot at the title, he would always take it on. So, he did. He went for an all-or-nothing double, and missed it. But the black ended up tight on the cushion, and the white went to the opposite end of the table. Davis then played a perfect safety shot, doubling the black to the bottom cushion. Taylor, fulfilling his vow, went to try and double, or treble the black into a pocket. But he missed, and the black ended up going agonisingly past the middle pocket - too far for Davis to pot it. Davis then went to play a cocked-hat safety shot, that would have sent the black on the bottom cushion and the white on the top cushion. But he hit it wrongly, and the black hit the wrong cushion initially, and he left Taylor a long pot for the match. Taylor took it on into the corner, but twitched on the shot and missed it. The black was sailing towards the diagonally opposite corner pocket, but it just missed, and stayed over the pocket and left Davis an easy black for the title. It was a thin cut, and Davis revealed afterwards that he "told himself not to overcut it", as he thought that would be the chokers approach. In doing so, he managed to undercut it, and left it over the pocket. As the white neared the black, the crowd roared to their feet as Taylor was on the black to win the match. After a lengthy pause, Taylor fired the black into the pocket and celebrated by shaking the cue over his head, and wagging his finger.
Taylor had become World Champion, and Davis lost his reputation as the best front runner in the game. The finish at 12:23am was the latest ever until the 2006, and then 2007 Finals beat it. The record is now almost 1:30am.
