The 2003 Regal Welsh Open was a professional

ranking A ranking is a relationship between a set of items such that, for any two items, the first is either "ranked higher than", "ranked lower than" or "ranked equal to" the second. In mathematics, this is known as a weak order or total preorder of ...

snooker tournament that took place from 22 to 26 January at the

Cardiff International Arena Cardiff International Arena (formerly known as Cardiff International Arena & Convention Centre and later, for sponsorship reasons, Motorpoint Arena Cardiff) is an indoor exhibition centre and events arena located in Cardiff, Wales, and was ope ...

Cardiff Cardiff (; cy, Caerdydd ) is the capital and largest city of Wales. It forms a principal area, officially known as the City and County of Cardiff ( cy, Dinas a Sir Caerdydd, links=no), and the city is the eleventh-largest in the United Kingd ...

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the Bristol Channel to the south. It had a population in ...

Paul Hunter Paul Alan Hunter (14 October 1978 – 9 October 2006) was an English professional snooker player. He was a three-time Masters champion, winning the event in 2001, 2002, and 2004, recovering from a deficit in the final to win 10–9 on a ...

was the defending champion, but he lost in the semi-finals 2–6 against Mark Williams. Williams in turn lost to

Stephen Hendry Stephen Gordon Hendry (born 13 January 1969) is a Scottish professional snooker player who dominated the sport during the 1990s, becoming one of the most successful players in its history. After turning professional in 1985 at age 16, Hendry ...

9–5 in the final. Hendry won his third Welsh Open title and the 34th

title of his career.

Tournament summary

Defending champion

was the number 1 seed with

World Champion 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, ...

Peter Ebdon Peter David Ebdon (born 27 August 1970) is an English former snooker player. The winner of the 2002 World Snooker Championship, Ebdon won nine world ranking events, placing twelfth on the all-time list of ranking tournament winners. In addit ...

seeded 2. The remaining places were allocated to players based on the world rankings.

Prize fund

The breakdown of prize money for this year is shown below: Winner: £82,500
Runner-up: £42,500
Semi-final: £21,250
Quarter-final: £11,700
Last 16: £9,600
Last 32: £7,800
Last 48: £4,000
Last 64: £3,150 Last 80: £2,150
Last 96: £1,450 Stage one highest break: £1,800
Stage two highest break: £7,500 Stage one maximum break: £5,000
Stage two maximum break: £20,000 Total: £597,200

Main draw

Final

Qualifying

Round 1

Best of 9 frames

Round 2–5

Century breaks

* 140, 127, 124, 113, 108, 104

* 139

Robin Hull Robin Hull (born 16 August 1974) is a Finnish former professional snooker player. For some time, he was the sole Nordic player on the game's main tour. He is known as a solid -builder, having compiled over 150 competitive during his career, a ...

* 133 Leo Fernandez * 132

Ali Carter Allister Carter (born 25 July 1979) is an English professional snooker player. He has twice been the World Championship runner-up, in 2008 and 2012, losing both finals to Ronnie O'Sullivan. He has won four ranking titles and briefly reached numb ...

* 128 Michael Holt * 127

John Higgins John Higgins, (born 18 May 1975) is a Scottish professional snooker player. He has won 31 career ranking titles, placing him in third position on the all-time list of ranking event winners, behind Ronnie O'Sullivan (39) and Stephen Hendry ( ...

* 120 Anthony Hamilton * 116, 100 Mark Williams * 110

* 109, 104

Ronnie O'Sullivan Ronald Antonio O'Sullivan (born 5 December 1975) is an English professional snooker player who is the current world champion and world number one. Widely recognised as one of the most talented and accomplished players in the sport's history, ...

* 109

Alan McManus Alan McManus (born 21 January 1971) is a Scottish retired professional snooker player and current commentator who works for Eurosport. A mainstay of the world's top sixteen during the 1990s and 2000s, he has won two ranking events, the 1994 Du ...

* 101, 101

Marco Fu Marco Fu Ka-chun, MH, JP (, born 8 January 1978) is a Hong Kong professional snooker player. He is a three-time snooker world rankings, ranking event winner, having won the 2007 Grand Prix (snooker), 2007 Grand Prix, the 2013 Australian ...

References

{{Snooker season 2002/2003 2003 Welsh Open Open (snooker) Welsh Open, 2003