The Thailand Masters was a professional snooker tournament. Previously known as Asian Open and Thailand Open, it was a

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 ...

tournament from 1989/90 to 2001/02. An event called the ''Thailand Masters'' also formed part of the ''

World Series The World Series is the annual championship series of Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada, contested since 1903 between the champion teams of the American League (AL) and the National League (NL). The winner of the World ...

'' in 1991/92, with

Steve Davis Steve Davis (born 22 August 1957) is an English retired professional snooker player who is currently a commentator, musician, DJ, and author. He is best known for dominating professional snooker during the 1980s, when he reached eight World S ...

beating

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 ...

6–3. The final champion was

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 ...

History

The Thailand Masters was first held in the 1983/1984 season. It was organised by

Matchroom Sport Matchroom Sport is a sporting event promotions company founded by English entrepreneur Barry Hearn and run by Hearn and his son Eddie Hearn. It first came to attention in the sports of snooker and boxing and is also involved in pool, bowling, go ...

as part of their

and sponsored by Camus, but was abandoned after 1986/1987. The event returned to the calendar in 1989 under the Asian Open name and it became a

tournament. In its first three years under this name the event was sponsored by 555 and then by

Nescafé Nescafé is a brand of coffee made by Nestlé. It comes in many different forms. The name is a portmanteau of the words "Nestlé" and "café". Nestlé first introduced their flagship coffee brand in Switzerland on 1 April 1938. History Nestl� ...

in 1993. All events took place in Bangkok, Thailand, except in 1990, which was held in China. In the 1991/1992 season two events were held. The Thailand Masters was part of the World Series and the Asian Open was a ranking event. In 1993

Dave Harold David Harold (born 9 December 1966) is an English former professional snooker player from Stoke-on-Trent. He was known by the nicknames of "the Hard Man" and "the Stoke Potter" (conflating his home city's pottery industry and his profession of ...

became the lowest ranked player to win a ranking tournament. He was ranked world number 93, when he beat

Darren Morgan Darren Morgan (born 3 May 1966) is a Welsh former professional snooker player who now competes as an amateur. Morgan won the World Amateur Championship in 1987 and played on the professional main tour from 1988 until 2006. He earned just ov ...

9–3. The event changed its name to Thailand Open in 1993/1994. The event was held in Bangkok and remained there until the 2002/2003 season. It was sponsored by Kloster, before Singha took over for 1995/1996. The event was renamed to the Thailand Masters in the 1997/1998 season and was sponsored by Beer Chang. The only official maximum break in the history of the competition came at the qualifying stages of the 1999 event.

Adrian Gunnell Adrian Gunnell (born 24 August 1972) is an English former professional snooker player from Telford. He has reached the last-16 in four world ranking events (three in Asia, in three different seasons, and at the 2008 Grand Prix), but has yet to ...

compiled it in the first round against

Mario Wehrmann is a character (arts), character created by Japanese video game designer Shigeru Miyamoto. He is the title character of the ''Mario (franchise), Mario'' franchise and the mascot of Japanese video game company Nintendo. Mario has appeared in ...

. The event didn't have a sponsor again until the 2000/2001 season, when it was sponsored by Blue Eagle and

Thai Airways Thai Airways International Public Company Limited, trading as THAI (, th, บริษัท การบินไทย จำกัด (มหาชน)) is the flag carrier airline of Thailand. Formed in 1961, the airline has its corporate h ...

and was sponsored by Singha in 2001/2002. The event lost its ranking status in 2002/2003, after World Snooker decided not to afford a Far East event. The event returned as a domestic event with several players from the Main Tour still competing. The event was last held in the 2006/2007 season with the sponsorship of Sangsom, but was discontinued after that.

Winners

References

{{Reflist Snooker ranking tournaments Recurring sporting events established in 1984 Recurring events disestablished in 2007 Masters 1984 establishments in Thailand 2007 disestablishments in Thailand Defunct snooker competitions