The fifth Chinese 8-Ball Pool Masters Championship kicked off on Tuesday in Qinhuangdao, a coastal city of north China's Hebei Province, marking another step forward to the globalization of the Chinese-style game.
The six-day event, jointly organized by the Hebei Provincial Bureau of Sports and the Qinhuangdao Municipal Government, has attracted the participation of 64 contestants from 26 countries.
Half of them are Chinese who qualified through domestic tournament, while the rest, who come from countries, including Argentina, Mexico, South Africa, Britain and the United States, got their tickets by means of recommendations or victories in overseas trials.
Among them are three-time world champion eight-ball pool player Gareth Potts, Filipino pool budding star Jeffrey Ignacio, and South African champion Velly Karel Diamond.
At the opening ceremony, snooker legend Stephen Hendry, the Global Ambassador of the Chinese 8-ball pool, read a joint declaration by China's International Chinese 8-Ball Association and Britain's Blackball International.
The two sides pledge to make billiards a global favorite pastime and push for it to "eventually be a part of the Olympic family," Hendry said.
Organizers also renewed their cooperative relations with 11 countries that will continue to hold overseas Chinese 8-ball games in 2017.
The Chinese 8-Ball Pool, which combines snooker style, nine-ball table size and American 8-Ball Pool competition rules, has been a unique Chinese game of billiards for decades, and has become increasingly popular abroad in recent years.
