87 Vietnamese players banned from competing for 6 months

The list of 245 players announced by WPA today includes 87 Vietnamese representatives, including almost all the masters such as Duong Quoc Hoang, Dang Thanh Kien, Do The Kien, Luong Duc Thien, Pham Phuong Nam and Nguyen Anh Tuan.

A number of top players in the world have also been banned, such as Carlo Biado, Ko Pin Yi, Shane van Boening, Fedor Gorst, Francisco Sanchez Ruiz, David Alcaide and Eklent Kaci. Of the current top 14 players on the World Nineball Tour (WNT), 13 are on the WPA sanctioned list, except for Joshua Filler and Albin Ouschan because these two players "turned around" and did not participate in the Hanoi Open.

"It is unfortunate that the Hanoi Open organizers did not seek to obtain a WPA license for the tournament, despite being invited," the federation said in a statement. "We have also repeatedly warned players about this tournament. They will be banned from competing for six months from participating in the Hanoi Open 2024."

The WPA was founded in 1987 and manages pool tournaments under the World Billiards Sports Federation (WCBS). The WCBS is a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC). The sanctioned Vietnamese players all belong to the Asian Billiards Sports Federation (ACBS), and ACBS is a member of the WPA.

WNT launches its own 9-ball pool tournament and leaderboard in 2023, initiated by British company Matchroom. The WPA had previously handed over the 9-ball tournaments to Matchroom in 2019, but a dispute between the two led to the company establishing the professional WNT to compete with the WPA. WNT tournaments often have much higher prize money than WPA.

The penalty is not surprising, as the WPA has warned many times in advance that the Hanoi Open 9-ball tournament is not licensed by the federation. However, most of the world's top players, whether in the WPA or WNT rankings, have come to Hanoi to compete, accepting the ban. Groups of players such as Boening, Gorst, Sanchez and Alcaide have all posted messages boycotting the WPA for banning Asian players from participating in the Hanoi Open. Now, this group of players has also been punished by the WPA.

245 players will not be allowed to participate in tournaments organized by their national federation, continental federation and the WPA. These include national championships, Asian championships, 8-ball, 10-ball world championships, or regional and continental sports meetings. They will only be able to participate in WNT tournaments, and unofficial tournaments.

After six months of suspension, any player who wants to return to compete in these tournaments will have to pay a fine of 500 USD to the national federation. This means that if Vietnam’s top pool players do not pay the fine, they will continue to be banned from participating in the SEA Games or Asiad.

The Vietnam Billiards & Snooker Federation (VBSF) is a member of ACBS. Meanwhile, the organizer of Hanoi Open 2024 is the Hanoi Billiards & Snooker Federation, not a member of ACBS. Before receiving the ban from WPA, Vietnamese players were also punished by ACBS for participating in Hanoi Open 2023, although the Hanoi Federation said the punishment was unfounded.

Hanoi Open 2024 takes place from October 8 to October 13 at Hanoi Indoor Athletics Palace, with a prize fund of 200,000 USD, of which 30,000 USD goes to champion Johann Chua.