Gao Yang (; born 5 September 2004) is a Chinese former professional

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

player.

Career

Gao Yang started playing on the Chinese tour aged just 13, and was quickly accepted by the CBSA Academy. He played in the

ACBS Asian Under-21 Snooker Championship The ACBS Asian Under-21 Snooker Championship is the premier non-professional junior snooker tournament in Asia. The event series is sanctioned by the Asian Confederation of Billiard Sports and started from 1993. In most of the seasons, the winner ...

in 2018 and 2019, the

IBSF World Under-21 Snooker Championship The IBSF World Under-21 Snooker Championship (also known as the World Amateur Under-21 Snooker Championship) is the premier non-professional junior snooker tournament in the world. The event series is sanctioned by the International Billiards and S ...

and

IBSF World Under-18 Snooker Championship The IBSF World Under-18 Snooker Championship (also known as the World Amateur Under-18 Snooker Championship) is a high-ranking non-professional junior snooker tournament. The event series is sanctioned by the International Billiards and Snooker Fede ...

also in 2018 and 2019. His only real success came in the 2019

, where he reached the final, losing 5–2 to the 13-year old

Jiang Jun Jiang may refer to: * ''Jiang'' (rank), rank held by general officers in the military of China *Jiang (surname), several Chinese surnames **Jiang Zemin (1926–2022), as general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party *Jiang River, an ancient riv ...

. His first taste of professional snooker came at the 2019 World Open, where he was a wildcard. Originally Gao's coach

Ju Reti Ju Reti ( zh, t=居熱提; ug, بارى مەمتىلى, lat=Jür'et Abdurëhim; born 19 September 1983) is a former Chinese professional snooker player. Career Amateur 2012/2013 Ju, a farmer, from the Xinjiang region China of the Uyghur eth ...

had qualified, but gave up his place in order to allow his pupil to gain experience. Gao lost the match 5–1 to

Lu Ning Lu Ning (, born 1 January 1994 in Jilin) is a professional snooker player from the People's Republic of China. Lu is among ten Chinese players currently suspended from the professional tour amid a match-fixing investigation. Career Lu's fir ...

. In January 2020 Gao won the WSF Junior Open, an under-18 tournament. He beat heralded juniors Ben Mertens, Dean Young and

Wu Yize Wu Yize (; born 14 October 2003) is a Chinese professional snooker player. Career Wu Yize won the IBSF U-21 World Championship in 2018 when he was just fourteen years old, defeating Pongsakorn Chongjairak from Thailand 6–4 in the final. Wu ...

, before overcoming Sean Maddocks 5–2 in the final. As a result, he was awarded a two-year card on the

World Snooker Tour The World Snooker Tour (WST) is the main professional snooker tour, consisting of approximately 128 players competing on a circuit of up to 28 tournaments each season. The World Snooker Tour is administered by World Snooker Ltd, the commercial ar ...

for the

2020–21 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

and 2021–22. Even though just 15 years old, he stated that he intended to take up his professional tour card. He thus became the second professional snooker player from Anhui, after his mentor

Niu Zhuang Niu Zhuang (, born 26 June 1994) is a Chinese former professional snooker player. Career Niu first received attention in world snooker when he entered APTC Event 2 in 2012, reaching the last 16 and defeating established professionals Mark Ki ...

2020/2021 season

As it happened, Gao turned 16 before the start of the 2020–21 season, which was delayed due to COVID-19. His first tournament was the

Championship League Championship League is a professional snooker tournament, devised by Matchroom Sport. A ranking event version of the tournament began from September 2020, played similarly to its invitational, non-ranking counterpart but with some minor changes ...

. Gao made 2-2 draws against

Ben Woollaston Ben Woollaston (born 14 May 1987) is an English professional snooker player from Leicester. His sole professional title came at the minor-ranking third Players Tour Championship event in 2011. Woollaston's only ranking event final came at the ...

and

Si Jiahui Si Jiahui (; born 11 July 2002) is a Chinese professional snooker player. Career In May 2019, Si qualified for the 2019–20 and 2020–21 professional Main Tour as Q School, as the highest ranked player on the Q School ranking list who didn' ...

, but lost 3–1 to Matt Selt. He finished his first day as a professional 3rd in the 4-player group but had made two century breaks. In subsequent tournaments Gao had wins against

Zhao Jianbo Zhao Jianbo (, born 27 August 2003) is a Chinese former professional snooker player. Zhao is among ten Chinese players currently suspended from World Snooker Tour events amid a match-fixing investigation. In January 2023, the WPBSA charged hi ...

Kacper Filipiak Kacper Filipiak (born 19 November 1995) is a former Polish professional snooker player. He turned professional in 2011 after winning the European Under-21 Championship, and became Poland's first player on snooker's professional Main Tour. He was t ...

Mitchell Mann Mitchell Mann (born 26 December 1991) is an English professional snooker player. Career Junior Mann first played snooker aged 9, after being forced to quit football after a diagnosis of Legg–Calvé–Perthes syndrome, a rare disease which r ...

and

Duane Jones Duane L. Jones (April 11, 1937July 22, 1988) was an American actor and theatre director, best known for his lead role as Ben in the 1968 horror film ''Night of the Living Dead''. He was later director of the Maguire Theater at the State Universi ...

. In the Northern Ireland Open Gao lost 4–0 to World No.1

Judd Trump Judd Trump (born 20 August 1989) is an English professional snooker player, a former world champion and former world number one. Widely regarded as one of the sport's most talented players, he is currently sixth on the list of all-time ranki ...

, who had breaks of 109, 127 and a maximum 147. In the

World Championship A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, ...

, Gao beat experienced player

Paul Davison Paul S. Davison (born 1 October 1971) is an English former professional snooker player from Pickering, North Yorkshire. First earning a place on the World Snooker Tour in 1992, he played on the tour until 1997, and has since regained his place o ...

6-3 and played very well against

Lyu Haotian Lyu Haotian (, born 29 November 1997) is a snooker player from the People's Republic of China, notable for being one of the youngest snooker players to have played in professional tournaments, aged only 14. He reached the quarter-finals of the ...

to lead 5–3. But his more experienced compatriot won the last 3 frames to edge the match 6–5. Gao finished his debut season ranked 107.

Style

Gao is known as an attacking left-hander. Unusually, he can play with either hand with the rest: with his left-hand he plays underarm in a manner pioneered by the Thai player

Sunny Akani Akani Songsermsawad (; born 10 September 1995), better known as Sunny Akani, is a Thai former professional snooker player. Career Early career Akani, a regular in amateur Thai snooker events since 2011, first came to international attention with ...

Personal life

During the season, Gao Yang lives in

Sheffield Sheffield is a city status in the United Kingdom, city in South Yorkshire, England, whose name derives from the River Sheaf which runs through it. The city serves as the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is Historic counties o ...

where he practices at the Ding Junhui Snooker Academy.

Performance and rankings timeline

Career finals

Amateur finals: 2 (1 title)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gao, Yang Living people Chinese snooker players 2004 births 21st-century Chinese people