Ricky Walden

Ricky Walden (born 11 November 1982) is an English professional snooker player from Chester.

Walden began his professional career by playing UK Tour in 1999 (renamed the Challenge Tour in 2000), at the time the second-level professional tour.

Walden turned professional in 2000 and it took him eight years to win his first ranking title at the Shanghai Masters.

He was one of the Young Players of Distinction in a scheme run in 2000, designed to help young players develop their playing and media skills, alongside Shaun Murphy, Stephen Maguire and Ali Carter.

In 2001 he won the World Under-21 Championship.

Then he played Challenge Tour in 2001 and entered Main Tour.

He started the 2004/2005 season ranked at number 78 in the world, but climbed 30 places that year.

He beat John Higgins twice that season, at the Grand Prix and UK Championship, and reached the quarter-final of the China Open.

In 2005–06 his best run was to the last 16 in the China Open, which he achieved by beating Stephen Maguire.

In 2006–07 he had 2 last-32 appearance including the UK Championship, where he lost to Ronnie O'Sullivan 8–9.

He lost to eventual finalist Mark Selby in qualifying for the World Championship.

He reached #36 for the 2007–08 season and the same year he reached the last 16 of the Grand Prix, beating John Parrott in qualifying and four top-32 players in the main round-robin stage.

He crashed out in the China Open to Mark Selby and in the qualifying for the World Championship, to Mark Allen.

Mark Allen was not impressed with Walden's behaviour during the match and coined the nickname Ricky "The Wally" Walden in his post match interview, which received some criticism from World Snooker.

Walden rebutted this by calling Allen a "fat c***", also commenting "I may be a wally but at least I don't waddle".

For this he received a fine a suspended 3 tournament ban.

In the 2008 Shanghai Masters he defeated Lee Spick and Ian McCulloch to qualify.

At the venue he defeated wildcard Zhang Anda, Stephen Hendry, Neil Robertson (5–4, from 1–4 down), Steve Davis in the quarter-finals (5–2, from 0–2 down), and Mark Selby in the semi-final (6–4, from 1–4 down).

He won his first ranking title by beating Ronnie O'Sullivan 10–8 in the final.

The rest of the season was solid rather than spectacular, but a qualifying victory over Anthony Hamilton earned him a first appearance at the Crucible Theatre, where he lost 6–10 to Mark Selby.

In 2008 he also won the Six-red Snooker International, beating Stuart Bingham 8–3 in the final.

Walden made it to the World Championship for the second time in 2011 as a seeded player, but was beaten by qualifier Rory McLeod 10–6.

After the match, Walden criticised McLeod for what he considered to be a slow and 'boring' style of play, although Walden was only marginally quicker than McLeod.

McLeod responded to the criticism by arguing that Walden was more responsible for the pace of the match.

Walden started the 2011–12 season by losing in qualifying for the first two ranking events of the year.

However, he qualified for the UK Championship by defeating Jamie Jones 6–2.

In the main draw he beat Stephen Lee, Mark Williams and Shaun Murphy all by 6–3 scorelines to set up a semi-final meeting with Mark Allen.

After the first session of the best-of 17-frames match Walden held a 5–3 advantage.

However, upon resumption in the evening he lost the opening four frames and would eventually lose the match 7–9.

This was Walden's first semi-final in a ranking event based in Britain.

Walden played in all 12 of the minor-ranking Players Tour Championship series of events throughout the season, reaching the final in Event 6, where he lost to Neil Robertson 1–4.

He has since won the 2012 Wuxi Classic and the 2014 International Championship and has been inside the top 16 in the season-ending rankings on four occasions.

A former world Top 6 player, Walden has reached the televised stages of the World Snooker Championship on nine occasions as of 2023, with his best result being a semi-finalist in 2013.

Walden was born in Chester but raised in Bagillt, North Wales, where he now lives once more, having spent some time living elsewhere in Flintshire.

This result was a large factor in him finishing 15th on the PTC Order of Merit, inside the top 24 who reached the Finals.

He also produced a maximum break during Event 10, the second 147 of the event.

At the Finals he whitewashed Matthew Stevens 4–0, before receiving a bye to the quarter-finals due to Ronnie O'Sullivan withdrawing from the event.

He played Stephen Maguire and was beaten 3–4.

Walden's performance in the UK Championship proved to be his best run in the ranking events of the season, as he could not get past the second round in any of the remaining tournaments.

His season finished in disappointment as he failed to qualify for the World Championship, losing to Jamie Jones 2–10.