Bai Yulu Defends World Women’s Snooker Championship Title in China
Bai Yulu has defeated Mink Nutcharut 6-4 in Dongguan Changping, China to successfully defend the World Women’s Snooker Championship title on home soil.
Victory for the 21-year-old underlines her status as already one of the outstanding female players of the modern game and sees her join Reanne Evans, Allison Fisher, Kelly Fisher, Karen Corr, Ng On Yee and the late Vera Selby as one of just seven multiple world champions since 1976.
The Chinese star was taking part in her third consecutive World Women’s Snooker Championship final and duly became the first player since Ng On Yee in 2018 to successfully defend the title.
For beaten opponent Mink, the wait for a second world title following her 2022 success goes on, the Thai player now having lost in three of her four finals contested since 2019.
The two pre-tournament top seeds met in a repeat of last year’s final in a best-of-11 frame title match contest that was watched by a large crowd at the Changping Gymnasium.
The first two frames of the final were shared between the two cueists who were each aiming to lift the most prestigious title on the World Women’s Snooker Tour for the second time in their careers.
Mink, the 2022 champion who was competing in her fourth final, managed to pull ahead at the interval to lead 3-1 and once again opened up a two-frame gap as she led 4-2 with a top break of 54.
Local favourite Bai refused to go down without a fight, however, and rallied with back-to-back frames to restore parity before going ahead for the first time in the match by taking frame nine with a contribution of 61 to move one away from victory at 5-4.
What ultimately turned out to be the final frame of the match was one that was full of drama as it came down to the last few balls and both players spurned opportunities to win it.
There were gasps from the crowd as Bai missed the ball altogether when attempting a thin pink across the length of the table for victory, only for Mink to go in-off after potting it and looking likely to force a dramatic decider.
After taking a moment to compose herself, the Chinese player fired home the pink from distance to complete a momentous victory on home soil.
