WPA World Nine-ball Championship

WPA World Nine-ball Championship
Current season, competition or edition:2025 WPA World Nine-ball Championship
Sport	Pool
Founded	1990
Founder	World Pool Association
Most recentchampion	Carlo Biado (2025)
Relatedcompetitions	Eight-ball, Ten-ball, Heyball
Official website	matchroompool.com

The WPA World Nine-ball Championship is an annual professional nine-ball pool tournament contested since 1990. The championship is sanctioned by the World Pool Association (WPA) and principally sponsored and organized by Matchroom Sport, who promote the event as the World Pool Championship. The championship has men's, women's, youth and wheelchair divisions.

History

In the summer of 1989, the World Pool-Billiard Association (now the World Pool Association or WPA) began plans for a world championship tournament. They created a provisional Board to oversee the creation of a tournament.^[1] The event was one of the first time the world's top nine-ball players met in a competition.^[2] The inaugural WPA World Nine-ball Championship was held in Bergheim, Germany. A men's event contested between 32 players was won by Earl Strickland and a 16-player women's event won by Robin Bell.^[3] A junior's event was first played in 1992, won by Hsia Hui-kai and a wheelchair event was created in 1999 first won by Bob Calderon.^[4] The event was organised solely by the WPA from this inauguration through 1999.^[5]

In July 1999, Matchroom Sport attempted to get involved with the organisation of the event, but their bid failed. The 1999 event was played in Alicante, Spain, and won by Nick Varner. Broadcast on ESPN, it was the first pro nine-ball championship to be televised.^[2] Matchroom Sport, meanwhile, instead organised a new tournament called the "World Professional Pool Championship", a competing event in Cardiff, Wales, which was won by Efren Reyes and broadcast on Sky Sports.^[6] With the World Professional Pool Championship being successful, the WPA and Matchroom agreed to merge their two tournaments, with both 1999 events being considered as official world championships.^[7]^[8] Matchroom continued to promote and organise the event until 2007 when it was not held after they were unable to fund it due to the 2008 financial crisis.^[2]^[5]

For the 2001 event, the number of competitors in the men's division was increased to 128 and a men's division first prize raised to $65,000 from $17,500.^[5]^[9] The event stayed in Wales until 2003.^[2] The prize money continued to increase. The 2004 and 2005 events were held in Taiwan, with a men's division first prize of $75,000.^[5] The pockets on the tables were narrowed, to make the game more difficult.^[10] The tournament moved to the Philippines in 2006 and 2007. the event ran from November 3–11, and Daryl Peach of the England was the victor.^[11]

After a two-year hiatus, the tournament returned being organised by the WPA as the 2010 WPA World Nine-ball Championship in Doha, Qatar.^[12] The event was then held annually in Doha through 2019.^[13] Prize money had reduced, with the winner's prize being $36,000, only rising to $40,000 by 2018.^[14]^[15] After not being contested in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the championship resumed in 2021 in Milton Keynes, England. The 2022 edition was April 6–10 in Milton Keynes.^[16]

Winners

^[17]

Year	Dates	Location	Winner	Runner-up	Final score
1990	March 3–7	Bergheim, Germany	Earl Strickland	Jeff Carter	3–1 (sets)
1991	May 29 – June 5	Las Vegas, United States	Earl Strickland(2)	Nick Varner	9–7
1992	April 1–5	Taipei, Taiwan	Johnny Archer	Bobby Hunter	13–12
1993	December 7–12	Königswinter, Germany	Chao Fong-pang	Thomas Hasch	2–0 (sets)
1994	November 2–6	Chicago, United States	Takeshi Okumura	Yasunari Itsuzaki	9–6
1995	November 15–19	Taipei, Taiwan	Oliver Ortmann	Dallas West	11–9
1996	October 23–27	Borlänge, Sweden	Ralf Souquet	Tom Storm	11–1
1997	October 1–5	Chicago, United States	Johnny Archer(2)	Lee Kun-fang	9–3
1998	November 11–15	Taipei, Taiwan	Kunihiko Takahashi	Johnny Archer	13–3
1999	July 18–26	Cardiff, Wales	Efren Reyes	Chang Hao-ping	17–8
1999	December 5–12	Alicante, Spain	Nick Varner	Jeremy Jones	13–8
2000	July 1–9	Cardiff, Wales	Chao Fong-pang(2)	Ismael Páez	17–6
2001	July 14–22		Mika Immonen	Ralf Souquet	17–10
2002	July 13–21		Earl Strickland(3)	Francisco Bustamante	17–15
2003	July 12–20		Thorsten Hohmann	Alex Pagulayan	17–10
2004	July 10–18	Taipei, Taiwan	Alex Pagulayan	Chang Pei-wei	17–13
2005	July 2–10	Kaohsiung, Taiwan	Wu Jia-qing	Kuo Po-cheng	17–16
2006	November 4–12	Pasay, Philippines	Ronato Alcano	Ralf Souquet	17–11
2007	November 3–11	Quezon City, Philippines	Daryl Peach	Roberto Gomez	17–15
2008	Not held due to the 2008 financial crisis
2009	Not held due to the 2008 financial crisis
2010	June 29 – July 5	Doha, Qatar	Francisco Bustamante	Kuo Po-cheng	13–7
2011	June 25 – July 1		Yukio Akakariyama	Ronato Alcano	13–11
2012	June 22–29		Darren Appleton	Li Hewen	13–12
2013	September 2–13		Thorsten Hohmann(2)	Antonio Gabica	13–7
2014	June 16–27		Niels Feijen	Albin Ouschan	13–10
2015	September 7–18		Ko Pin-yi	Shane Van Boening	13–11
2016	August 1–4		Albin Ouschan	Shane Van Boening	13–6
2017	December 5–14		Carlo Biado	Roland Garcia	13–5
2018	December 10–20		Joshua Filler	Carlo Biado	13–10
2019	December 13–17		Fedor Gorst	Chang Jung-lin	13–11
2020	Not held due to the COVID-19 pandemic
2021	June 6–10	Milton Keynes, England	Albin Ouschan(2)	Omar Al-Shaheen	13–9
2022	April 6–10	Milton Keynes, England	Shane Van Boening	Albin Ouschan	13–6
2023	February 1–5	Kielce, Poland	Francisco Sánchez Ruiz	Mohammad Soufi	13–10
2024	June 3–8	Jeddah, Saudi Arabia	Fedor Gorst(2)	Eklent Kaçi	15–14
2025	July 21–26	Jeddah, Saudi Arabia	Carlo Biado(2)	Fedor Gorst	15–13

Records

Earl Strickland holds the record for winning the WPA World Nine-ball Championship the most times with three. (1990, 1991, 2002).
Earl Strickland holds the record for the most consecutive wins with two. (1990, 1991).
Albin Ouschan holds the record for the most final appearances with four. (2014, 2016, 2021, 2022).
The oldest pool player to ever win the tournament to date is Nick Varner of the United States, at 51 years old at the time of his victory, The youngest is Wu Jia-qing of Chinese Taipei, aged 16 years old at the time of his victory.

Top performers