The Masters Qualifying Event was a professional

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

tournament, which ran from 1990 to 2009. Each season, the winner of the event was awarded a wild-card to play at the Masters.

History

At the 1990 Masters two wild-cards were added to the tournament and the following season a qualifying tournament was established for one of these wild-cards. The tournament was named Benson & Hedges Championship. The event was held in

Glasgow Glasgow is the Cities of Scotland, most populous city in Scotland, located on the banks of the River Clyde in Strathclyde, west central Scotland. It is the List of cities in the United Kingdom, third-most-populous city in the United Kingdom ...

and Alan McManus became the inaugural champion. In the 1992/1993 season it became one of the minor-ranking events along with the three Strachan Challenge events. These events carried one-tenth of the ranking points of other tournaments. but most of the top players did not enter, so it lost ranking status from the next season. The event was then moved to

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

in 1994/1995 for three years, to Malvern in 1997/1998 for four years and to

Mansfield Mansfield is a market town and the administrative centre of the Mansfield District in Nottinghamshire, England. It is the largest town in the wider Mansfield Urban Area and the second largest settlement in Nottinghamshire (following the city ...

in 2001/2002 for two years. In 2003/2004 the event was renamed to Masters Qualifying Event due to restrictions on tobacco advertising in the United Kingdom. The event was held in Prestatyn; the top 16 players were excluded from the event and other non-participating Main Tour members were replaced by top players from the

Challenge Tour The Challenge Tour, currently titled as the HotelPlanner Tour for sponsorship reasons and also sometimes referred to as the European Challenge Tour, is the second-tier men's professional golf tour in Europe. It is operated by the PGA European To ...

Order of Merit. After a season away, the Masters Qualifying Event returned to the calendar in 2005/2006, and was moved to the English Institute of Sport in

Sheffield Sheffield is a city in South Yorkshire, England, situated south of Leeds and east of Manchester. The city is the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire and some of its so ...

next season for three years. The event was last held in Prestatyn during the 2009/10 season. There has been five official

maximum break A maximum break (also known as a maximum, a 147, or orally, a onefourseven) is the highest possible in snooker in normal circumstances and is a special type of . A player compiles a maximum break by potting all 15 with 15 for 120 points, fo ...

s during the history of the tournament. Karl Burrows made the first against Adrian Rosa in 1999. The second was made in 2000 by David McLellan against Steve Meakin, the third in 2001 by

Shaun Murphy Shaun Peter Murphy (born 10 August 1982) is an English professional snooker player who won the 2005 World Snooker Championship, 2005 World Championship and has completed the Triple Crown (snooker), Triple Crown. Nicknamed "The Magician", Murp ...

against Adrian Rosa and the fourth in 2002 by Tony Drago against Stuart Bingham. The last came at the 2005 event by Bingham against Marcus Campbell. There was one further maximum break by Terry Murphy against Robert Thallon but it was not officially ratified due to the match being played on one of the outside non-templated tables.

Winners

References

{{Snooker tournaments Snooker minor-ranking tournaments Snooker non-ranking competitions Qualifiers Snooker competitions in the United Kingdom Recurring sporting events established in 1990 Recurring events disestablished in 2009 1990 establishments in Scotland 2009 disestablishments in Wales Defunct snooker competitions Defunct sports competitions in the United Kingdom