Graeme Dott Furious At Scottish Open TV Snub

It was mixed emotions for the home hopefuls on the opening day of the Scottish Open.

Although four-time world champion John Higgins came off the table with a big smile on his face, Graeme Dott was furious having been snubbed by the TV cameras in his home city.

The Pocket Dynamo is heading home early after losing 4-2 to Rory McLeod in the opening round.

More than the defeat itself, Dott was disgusted his match was not televised and took to Facebook afterwards to share his displeasure.

He said: “Win or lose I never put anything on here but I need to get this off my chest.

“I’m playing in my home city of Glasgow as a former world champion and I still don’t get put on a TV table and I find this unacceptable.

“As the Welsh lads get on TV tables in Wales and also the Irish in Ireland, it’s been well documented that I get shown no respect from WSA or TV and today proves it.

“People might ask who was on the TV table: Ronnie O’Sullivan? John Higgins? The answer is nobody it was empty, hard not to feel victimised, the biggest slap in the face I’ve ever took, total lack of respect.”

Rocket inspiration

Higgins was in finer spirits after comfortably beating Jack Lisowski comfortably 4-1 to progress to the last 64 of a tournament the was runner-up in a year ago.

He had hinted it was the beginning of the end of his career after losing to Mark King in the last 16 at the UK Championship – but came back with a bang and admitted it was Ronnie O’Sullivan who had helped him to pick his cue back up.

“It was probably stupid what I was saying,” explained John. “I just had terrible negative thinking and the press hit you 10 seconds after walk out of the arena and you’re still sore for the game, but it was more to do with my mind.

“I watched Ronnie’s evening’s session against Shaun (Murphy) and it made me pick my cue up. I was thinking of coming in today, maybe having five minutes before going on to play but last night I was enjoying watching a genius at work and thought I’d go for a bit of practice.”