Cue Sports Results: What Club Players Can Learn

The last ten days gave club players plenty to chew on. A women's heyball final in Toronto that ran out of time and went to a shootout, an all Filipino nine ball final in Quezon City, and a ranking snooker event in Nanjing where a 100 century milestone landed quietly in a qualifier. These cue sports results are worth more than a glance at a scoreline, because almost every one of them points at something you can work on at your own club this week.

Heyball in Toronto: a final that ran out of time

The 2026 WPA North American Heyball Open ran from 26 to 30 October in Toronto, Canada, across five days of qualifying and knockout play. João Grilo of Portugal took the men's title, beating Jordan Shepherd of Great Britain 7-4 in the final, with Arfan Dad of Pakistan and Karol Skowerski of Poland sharing third.

The women's final was the one people will remember. Wendy Jans of Belgium and Veronika Halliday of Germany were locked at 5 apiece when time expired, so the title went to a best of five shootout. Jans won it 4 to 1, taking the match 6 to 5 overall. Sara Rocha of Portugal and Eylul Kibaroglu of Turkey finished joint third.

Worth noting for anyone who follows the money in cue sports: the event carried a combined prize fund of US$116,000, split equally between the two divisions at US$58,000 each, with a champion's cheque of US$10,000 in both.

What a shootout teaches you about your own game

Heyball is played on a tight table with a demanding pocket cut, and a timed format turns that into a different sport altogether. Two habits separate players who cope with the clock from players who unravel under it.

• Decide, then commit. Most time trouble is not slow cueing, it is slow deciding. Pick the shot while you are still standing, not after you are down on it.
• Practise the single ball. A shootout is one ball from a set spot under maximum pressure. If you have never drilled that in isolation, the first time you try it will be the one that matters.
• Know your out early. On a tight heyball table the run out is decided two or three balls before the clock becomes a problem.

If heyball is your discipline, our heyball practice drills for sharper potting are built around exactly this kind of margin.

Pool: an all Filipino final in Quezon City

Johann Chua won the Philippines Open in Quezon City, beating fellow Filipino Anton Raga 11-9 in the final for a US$20,000 champion's cheque. Reports on 24 October noted that he became the first Filipino to win a World Nineball Tour major on home soil. He got there through Carlo Biado, James Aranas and Bernie Regalario, the last of those 10 to 2 in the semi final. Raga's run took in Jayson Shaw, Jefrey Roda and Baseth Mocaibat, whom he beat 10 to 6.

The same week brought an unusual piece of Mosconi Cup news. Thorsten Hohmann declined his place on the USA team after qualifying automatically, having reached the last 16 in Quezon City. He was open about the reason, saying he had to be honest about his game.

Long races reward the boring stuff

An 11-9 final is twenty racks of nine ball between two players who know each other's game well. Matches like that are rarely won by a flashy clearance. They are won by the player whose safety game does not leak and whose cue ball ends up where it was meant to, rack after rack, in the fourth hour as reliably as the first.

That is the least glamorous thing to practise and the most profitable. Our pool position play drills are aimed at the part of the table where long races are actually decided.

Snooker: Nanjing, and a milestone in the qualifiers

The 2026 International Championship is under way at the South New City National Fitness Center in Nanjing, China, running from 31 October to 7 November. It is the eighth ranking event of the 2026/27 World Snooker Tour season, with a total prize fund of £825,000 and £175,000 to the winner. Wu Yize defends the title he won by beating John Higgins 10-6 in the 2025 final.

The main stage is still live, so the headline result is not in yet. Three seeds are missing: Shaun Murphy, Barry Hawkins and Luca Brecel all withdrew, announced on 29 October. The qualifiers in Leicester back in September had already produced a few results that raised eyebrows, with Anton Kazakov beating Ali Carter 6-2 and Liam Davies beating Anthony McGill 6-1.

The detail we liked most, though, is a counting milestone. Chang Bingyu became the 94th player in history to make 100 century breaks, and he did it during a 6-2 win over Ross Muir. There have been 46 centuries at the Nanjing main stage so far.

A hundred centuries is a record keeping story

Nobody announces a hundredth century on the day it happens unless somebody has been counting all along. That is the quiet lesson in it. The professional game knows precisely how many centuries, how many deciders and how many frames every player has produced, because every match is recorded.

Most club players know none of that about themselves. They remember the good nights and forget the pattern. If you want the long view of your own game, our 27 best snooker practice routines give you something repeatable to measure, and the drills in the CuePal app can be tracked the same way.

Where club cue sports results get counted

Professional cue sports results exist because somebody writes them down. At club level that is usually the gap. A friendly on a Tuesday, a league frame on a Thursday and a tournament match at the weekend all happen, and then they vanish into memory and a group chat.

That is the part CuePal is built to fix. Results recorded at the club feed a rating, so a player can see where they actually sit rather than where they feel they sit.

Every verified result moves the number, up or down, and the movement is shown against the match it came from. Over a season that turns a pile of individual nights into something you can read: a trend, a plateau, a purple patch after a change of technique.

It also settles arguments. A rating built on recorded results is a far better answer to who is playing well right now than the loudest voice at the bar.

Three things to take to the table this week

• Drill one pressure ball. Pick a single shot, set it up ten times, and keep the score. Toronto's shootout is a reminder that one ball can carry a title.
• Audit your safeties, not your pots. Chua did not beat Raga over twenty racks on potting alone. Count how many of your safeties leave a shot and work on that number.
• Start recording. Centuries, frames won, deciders, break average. Pick one and track it from this week, because a hundred of anything starts with counting the first.

Follow the game, and your own form with it

Nanjing runs to 7 November, so the biggest result of this stretch is still to come. In the meantime the week has already offered a shootout title, a home soil major and a century milestone, which is a fair return for ten days of cue sports.

If you run a club and want your own members' results counted properly, you can set one up with CuePal club management software and create your club at clubs.cuepal.co, or book a demo and we will walk you through it.