1.
Liverpool
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Liverpool is a major city and metropolitan borough in North West England.24 million people in 2011. Liverpool historically lay within the ancient hundred of West Derby in the south west of the county of Lancashire and it became a borough from 1207 and a city from 1880. In 1889 it became a county borough independent of Lancashire, Liverpool sits on the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary and its growth as a major port is paralleled by the expansion of the city throughout the Industrial Revolution. Along with general cargo, freight, raw materials such as coal and cotton, the city was also directly involved in the Atlantic slave trade. Liverpool was home to both the Cunard and White Star Line, and was the port of registry of the ocean liner RMS Titanic and others such as the RMS Lusitania, Queen Mary, and Olympic. The city celebrated its 800th anniversary in 2007, and it held the European Capital of Culture title together with Stavanger, Norway, several areas of Liverpool city centre were granted World Heritage Site status by UNESCO in 2004. The Liverpool Maritime Mercantile City includes the Pier Head, Albert Dock, tourism forms a significant part of the citys economy. Liverpool is also the home of two Premier League football clubs, Liverpool and Everton, matches between the two being known as the Merseyside derby, the world-famous Grand National horse race takes place annually at Aintree Racecourse on the outskirts of the city. The city is home to the oldest Black African community in the country. Natives of Liverpool are referred to as Liverpudlians and colloquially as Scousers, a reference to scouse, the word Scouse has also become synonymous with the Liverpool accent and dialect. Pool is a place name element in England from the Brythonic word for a pond, inlet, or pit, cognate with the modern Welsh. The derivation of the first element remains uncertain, with the Welsh word Llif as the most plausible relative and this etymology is supported by its similarity to that of the archaic Welsh name for Liverpool Llynlleifiad. Other origins of the name have suggested, including elverpool. The name appeared in 1190 as Liuerpul, and it may be that the place appearing as Leyrpole, in a record of 1418. King Johns letters patent of 1207 announced the foundation of the borough of Liverpool, the original street plan of Liverpool is said to have been designed by King John near the same time it was granted a royal charter, making it a borough. The original seven streets were laid out in an H shape, Bank Street, Castle Street, Chapel Street, Dale Street, Juggler Street, Moor Street, in the 17th century there was slow progress in trade and population growth. Battles for the town were waged during the English Civil War, in 1699 Liverpool was made a parish by Act of Parliament, that same year its first slave ship, Liverpool Merchant, set sail for Africa. Since Roman times, the city of Chester on the River Dee had been the regions principal port on the Irish Sea
2.
England
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England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west, the Irish Sea lies northwest of England and the Celtic Sea lies to the southwest. England is separated from continental Europe by the North Sea to the east, the country covers five-eighths of the island of Great Britain in its centre and south, and includes over 100 smaller islands such as the Isles of Scilly, and the Isle of Wight. England became a state in the 10th century, and since the Age of Discovery. The Industrial Revolution began in 18th-century England, transforming its society into the worlds first industrialised nation, Englands terrain mostly comprises low hills and plains, especially in central and southern England. However, there are uplands in the north and in the southwest, the capital is London, which is the largest metropolitan area in both the United Kingdom and the European Union. In 1801, Great Britain was united with the Kingdom of Ireland through another Act of Union to become the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922 the Irish Free State seceded from the United Kingdom, leading to the latter being renamed the United Kingdom of Great Britain, the name England is derived from the Old English name Englaland, which means land of the Angles. The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages, the Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea. The earliest recorded use of the term, as Engla londe, is in the ninth century translation into Old English of Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its spelling was first used in 1538. The earliest attested reference to the Angles occurs in the 1st-century work by Tacitus, Germania, the etymology of the tribal name itself is disputed by scholars, it has been suggested that it derives from the shape of the Angeln peninsula, an angular shape. An alternative name for England is Albion, the name Albion originally referred to the entire island of Great Britain. The nominally earliest record of the name appears in the Aristotelian Corpus, specifically the 4th century BC De Mundo, in it are two very large islands called Britannia, these are Albion and Ierne. But modern scholarly consensus ascribes De Mundo not to Aristotle but to Pseudo-Aristotle, the word Albion or insula Albionum has two possible origins. Albion is now applied to England in a poetic capacity. Another romantic name for England is Loegria, related to the Welsh word for England, Lloegr, the earliest known evidence of human presence in the area now known as England was that of Homo antecessor, dating to approximately 780,000 years ago. The oldest proto-human bones discovered in England date from 500,000 years ago, Modern humans are known to have inhabited the area during the Upper Paleolithic period, though permanent settlements were only established within the last 6,000 years
3.
Glossary of cue sports terms
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There are also hybrid pocket/carom games such as English billiards. The terms American or US as applied here refer generally to North American usage, similarly, British terms predominate in the world of snooker, English billiards and blackball, regardless of the players nationalities. The term blackball is used in this glossary to refer to both blackball and eight-ball pool as played in the Commonwealth, as a shorthand, 1-cushion See the Straight rail billiards main article for the game sometimes called one-cushion. 1-pocket See the One-pocket main article for the game, 3-ball See the Three-ball main article for the game. 3-cushion See the Three-cushion billiards main article for the game, 4-ball See the Yotsudama main article for the modern Asian game often called four-ball. See the American four-ball billiards main article for the nineteenth-century game, 5-pins See the Five-pin billiards main article for the formerly Italian, now internationally standardized game, or Danish pin billiards for the five-pin traditional game of Denmark. 6-ball See the Nine-ball#Six-ball sub-article for the game, 8-ball See the Eight-ball main article for the game. See the 8 ball entry, under the E section below, See 8 ball for derivative uses. 9-ball See the Nine-ball main article for the game, See the 9 ball entry, under the N section below, for the ball. 9-pins See the Goriziana main article for the game sometimes called nine-pins, 10-ball See the Ten-ball main article for the game. Above Used in snooker in reference to the position of the cue ball and it is above the object ball if it is off-straight on the baulk cushion side of the imaginary line for a straight pot. It is also common to use the term high instead, gambling or the potential for gambling. Lively results on a ball, usually the cue ball, from the application of spin, added Used with an amount to signify money added to a tournament prize fund in addition to the amount accumulated from entry fees. A match format in which a player has to establish a lead of a number of frames in order to win. Aiming line An imaginary line drawn from the path an object ball is to be sent. Anchor To freeze a ball to a cushion, such a ball may be said to be anchored and this term is largely obsolete balkline billiards jargon. Anchor nurse A type of shot used in carom billiards games. It developed to curtail the effectiveness of the nurse, which in turn had been invented to thwart the effectiveness of Parkers box in stopping long
4.
Snooker
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Snooker is a cue sport which originated in India in the latter half of the 19th century. It is played on a covered with a green cloth, or baize, with pockets at each of the four corners. Using a cue and 22 coloured balls, players must strike the ball to pot the remaining balls in the correct sequence. An individual game, or frame, is won by the player who scores the most points, a match is won when a player wins a predetermined number of frames. In the 1870s, billiards was a sport played by members of the British Army stationed in India. Snooker gained its own identity in 1884 when officer Sir Neville Chamberlain, while stationed in Ooty, devised a set of rules that combined pyramid, the word snooker was a long used military term used to describe inexperienced or first year personnel. The game grew in popularity in England, cemented by the formation of the Billiards Association and it is now governed by the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association. The World Snooker Championship has taken place since 1927, with Joe Davis becoming a key figure in the growth of the sport with 15 championship wins from 1927 to 1946. Top professional players now compete regularly around the world and attain multi-million-pound career earnings, the sport has become increasingly popular in China. The origin of snooker dates back to the half of the nineteenth century. In the 1870s, billiards was a popular activity amongst British Army officers stationed in India, one such variation originated at the officers mess of the 11th Devonshire Regiment in Jabalpur in 1875, which combined the rules of two pocket billiards games, pyramid and life pool. The former was played with fifteen red balls and one positioned in a triangle, while the latter involved the potting of designated coloured balls. The name instantly stuck with the players, in 1887, snooker was given its first definite reference in England in a copy of Sporting Life which caused a growth in popularity. Chamberlain came out as the inventor in a letter to The Field published on 19 March 1938,63 years after the fact. To accommodate the growing interest, smaller and more open snooker-specific clubs were formed, in 1919, the Billiards Association and the Billiards Control Board merged to form the Billiards Association and Control Club and a new, standard set of rules for snooker first became official. Davis won every championship until 1946 when he retired. The game went into a decline through the 1950s and 1960s with little interest generated outside of those who played, in 1959, Davis introduced a variation of the game, known as snooker plus to try to improve the games popularity by adding two extra colours. The TV series became a success and was for a time the second most popular show on BBC Two
5.
Basildon
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Basildon /ˈbæzɪldən/ is the largest town in the borough of Basildon in the county of Essex, England. It lies 32 miles east of Central London,11 miles south of the city of Chelmsford and 10 miles west of Southend-on-Sea, nearby smaller towns include Billericay to the north, Wickford northeast and South Benfleet to the east. It was created as a new town after World War II in 1948 to accommodate the London population overspill, from the conglomeration of four villages, namely Pitsea, Laindon, Basildon. The new town took the name Basildon was the most central of the four. Basildon Town is one of the most densely populated areas in the county, Basildon also has access to the City via road, on the A127, and A13. The first historical reference to Basildon is in records from 1086 and it is mentioned in the Domesday Book as Belesduna. The name Basildon may be derived from the Anglo-Saxon personal name Boerthal, in historical documents, this name had various forms over the centuries, including Berdlesdon, Batlesdon and Belesduna. A significant number of residents do commute to London. In the 1940s, Billericay Urban District Council and Essex County Council, concerned by lack of amenities in the area and by its development, Basildon was one of eight New Towns created in the South East of England after the passing of the New Towns Act. On 4 January 1949 Lewis Silkin, Minister of Town and Country Planning, Basildon Development Corporation was formed in February 1949 to transform the designated area into a modern new town. The New Town incorporated Laindon and Pitsea and was laid out around small neighbourhoods with the first house being completed in June 1951, the first tenants moved into homes in Redgrave Road in Vange. A large, illuminated town sign Basildon Town Centre Site at 3.5 feet was erected in 1956 by the railway, the first leader elected for the local government district in 1974 was Ryan ORourke. Unusually, since March 2010 Basildon has a famous white Hollywood sign, reading Basildon, at five feet tall. Opponents from all parties believe spending could have been directed toward social problems, the constituency of Basildon was considered a barometer of public opinion in general elections. The results of the elections have been the same as the overall result of general elections since 1983. Basildon was said to epitomise the working class conversion to Thatcherism during the 1980s, nor did the Conservative Party ever hold an absolute majority in the town - its success was due to the split between the SDP and the Labour Party. Basildon Man or Essex Man was coined to describe an aspirational working class voter, the current MP is Tory politician John Baron. Due to boundary changes, in the 2010 General Election the Basildon and Billericay constituency elected 1 MP and South Basildon, in terms of local politics Basildon District elects five Councillors to Essex County Council
6.
Birkenhead
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Birkenhead /ˌbɜːrkənˈhɛd/ is a town within the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral in Merseyside, England. Historically in Cheshire, it is on the Wirral Peninsula, along the west bank of the River Mersey, the Birkenhead Urban Area defined as the contiguous built-up area along the eastern side of the Wirral had a total population of 325,264 in the 2011 Census. In the 2011 census, the Parliamentary constituency of Birkenhead had a population of 88,818, the Birkenhead and Tranmere electoral ward, covering a much smaller area, had a population of 15,879. The recorded history of Birkenhead began with the establishment of Birkenhead Priory, during the 19th century Birkenhead expanded greatly, becoming a town as a consequence of the Industrial Revolution, with Birkenhead Park and Hamilton Square being examples of the era. Around the same time, Birkenhead gained the first street tramway in Britain, later, the Mersey Railway connected Birkenhead and Liverpool, with the worlds first tunnel beneath a tidal estuary. Birkenhead is perhaps best known for the shipbuilding of Cammell Laird, in the second half of the 20th century, the town suffered a significant period of decline, with containerisation causing a reduction in port activity. During the first half of the 21st century, the Wirral Waters development is planned to regenerate much of the dockland. The name Birkenhead probably means headland overgrown with birch, from the Old English bircen meaning birch tree, the name is not derived from the Birket, a stream which enters the Mersey between Birkenhead and Seacombe. The Birket is a name which was introduced by Ordnance Survey. The earliest records state that the Mersey ferry began operating from Birkenhead in 1150, the priory was visited in 1275 and 1277 by Edward I. In a royal charter of 13 April 1330, Edward III granted the priory further rights, distanced from the Industrial Revolution in Liverpool by the physical barrier of the River Mersey, Birkenhead retained its agricultural status until the advent of steam ferry services. In 1817 a steam ferry service started from Liverpool to Tranmere and in 1822 the paddle steamer, Royal Mail, an iron works was initially established by William Laird in 1824 and was joined by his son John Laird in 1828. The business eventually became Cammell Laird, merchant vessels were also built such as RMS Mauretania and RMS Windsor Castle. The Mersey Railway tunnel opened in 1886, providing direct access to Liverpool. In September 1932 thousands of unemployed people protested in a series of demonstrations organised by the branch of the National Unemployed Workers Movement. After three days of rioting, police were brought in from elsewhere to help quell the rioters, in addition to the ferries and the railway, the Queensway road tunnel opened in 1934 and gave rapid access to Liverpool. This opened up the Wirral Peninsula for development, and prompted further growth of Birkenhead as an industrial centre. Bolstered by migration from rural Cheshire, southern Ireland and Wales, formerly a township in Bidston Parish of the Wirral Hundred, Birkenhead was incorporated as a municipal borough in 1877, and became a county borough with the passing of the Local Government Act 1888
7.
Shaun Murphy (snooker player)
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Shaun Murphy is an English professional snooker player, who won the 2005 World Championship. Nicknamed The Magician, Murphy is noted for his cue action. Born in Harlow and raised in Irthlingborough, Murphy turned professional in 1998 and his victory at the World Championship was considered a major surprise as he was only the third qualifier to lift the title. He has also won seven non-ranking tournaments, including the 2015 Masters, Murphy has won over £3 million in prize money and has compiled more than 400 century breaks in his professional career. His highest world ranking was number three, which he maintained for three seasons following 2007/2008, and he is ranked number four. Born in Harlow, England, Murphy began playing snooker at the age of eight after his parents bought him a table for Christmas. He made his first century break at the age of 10 and practised at the Rushden Snooker Centre, where such as Stephen Hendry, Mark Williams. At the age of 13, he secured a five-year £5, 000-a-year sponsorship deal with the Doc Martens shoe company and stated his ambitions of winning the World Championship and he turned professional in 1998 at the age of 15. Murphy was coached by Steve Prest until the 2006/2007 season, willie Thorne and Ray Reardon also gave him guidance, and when he was 15, he was given the latters old cue by his father. Murphy began his career on the UK Tour in 1998, at the time the professional tour. He was runner-up in the event on the UK tour for the 1997/1998 season and, for the 2000/2001 season, won the third and fourth events on the Challenge Tour. In 2000, he received the World Snooker Newcomer of the Year award and one of six Young Player of Distinction of the Year awards from the World Professional Billiards, in 2000, he won the English Open Championship. Murphy won his first professional tournament at the 2000 Benson & Hedges Championship, defeating Mark Davis 6–1 in the semi-final, and Stuart Bingham 9–7 in the final, recovering from 2–5 down. In the 2001 tournament, he showed promise in his first televised match, defeating world number 15, Marco Fu and he made his first maximum break in the 2001 Benson & Hedges Championship. Murphy first reached the stages of a ranking event at the 2002 World Championship, hosted at the Crucible Theatre. For the 2003/2004 season, Murphy was ranked number 64 and qualified for the stages of three ranking tournaments. In the LG Cup, Murphy defeated Steve Davis 5–4 in the second round, after the victory over Davis, Murphy said This is one of the greatest days in my snooker career. In the British Open, he defeated Dave Harold 5–1 in the first round, in the Players Championship—the new name of the Scottish Open—he lost 3–5 to eventual champion Jimmy White in the second round
8.
Pound sterling
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It is subdivided into 100 pence. A number of nations that do not use sterling also have called the pound. At various times, the sterling was commodity money or bank notes backed by silver or gold. The pound sterling is the worlds oldest currency still in use, the British Crown dependencies of Guernsey and Jersey produce their own local issues of sterling, the Guernsey pound and the Jersey pound. The pound sterling is also used in the Isle of Man, Gibraltar, the Bank of England is the central bank for the pound sterling, issuing its own coins and banknotes, and regulating issuance of banknotes by private banks in Scotland and Northern Ireland. Sterling is the fourth most-traded currency in the exchange market, after the United States dollar, the euro. Together with those three currencies it forms the basket of currencies which calculate the value of IMF special drawing rights, Sterling is also the third most-held reserve currency in global reserves. The full, official name, pound sterling, is used mainly in formal contexts, otherwise the term pound is normally used. The abbreviations ster. or stg. are sometimes used, the term British pound is commonly used in less formal contexts, although it is not an official name of the currency. The pound sterling is also referred to as cable amongst forex traders, the origins of this term are attributed to the fact that in the 1800s, the dollar/pound sterling exchange rate was transmitted via transatlantic cable. Forex brokers are sometimes referred to as cable dealers, as another established source notes, the compound expression was then derived, silver coins known as sterlings were issued in the Saxon kingdoms,240 of them being minted from a pound of silver. Hence, large payments came to be reckoned in pounds of sterlings, in 1260, Henry III granted them a charter of protection. And because the Leagues money was not frequently debased like that of England, English traders stipulated to be paid in pounds of the Easterlings, and land for their Kontor, the Steelyard of London, which by the 1340s was also called Easterlings Hall, or Esterlingeshalle. For further discussion of the etymology of sterling, see sterling silver, the currency sign for the pound sign is £, which is usually written with a single cross-bar, though a version with a double cross-bar is also sometimes seen. The ISO4217 currency code is GBP, occasionally, the abbreviation UKP is used but this is non-standard because the ISO3166 country code for the United Kingdom is GB. The Crown dependencies use their own codes, GGP, JEP, stocks are often traded in pence, so traders may refer to pence sterling, GBX, when listing stock prices. A common slang term for the pound sterling or pound is quid, since decimalisation in 1971, the pound has been divided into 100 pence. The symbol for the penny is p, hence an amount such as 50p properly pronounced fifty pence is more colloquially, quite often, pronounced fifty pee /fɪfti, pi and this also helped to distinguish between new and old pence amounts during the changeover to the decimal system
9.
Merseyside
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Merseyside is a metropolitan county in North West England, with a population of 1.38 million. Merseyside, which was created on 1 April 1974 as a result of the Local Government Act 1972, Merseyside spans 249 square miles of land which border Lancashire, Greater Manchester, Cheshire and the Irish Sea to the west. North Wales is across the Dee Estuary, there is a mix of high density urban areas, suburbs, semi-rural and rural locations in Merseyside, but overwhelmingly the land use is urban. For the 12 years following 1974 the county had a system of local government. The county council was abolished in 1986, and so its districts are now effectively unitary authority areas, Merseyside is joined by the neighbouring borough of Halton to form the Liverpool City Region, which together forms a local enterprise partnership and combined authority area. Further areas, including Widnes and Runcorn, were added to the Special Review Area by Order in 1965, draft proposals were published in 1965, but the commission never completed its final proposals as it was abolished in 1966. This would have included four districts, Southport/Crosby, Liverpool/Bootle, St. Helens/Widnes, in 1970 the Merseyside Passenger Transport Executive was set up, covering Liverpool, Sefton, Wirral and Knowsley, but excluding Southport and St. Helens. The Redcliffe-Maud Report was rejected by the incoming Conservative Party government, a White Paper was published in 1971. The Local Government Bill presented to Parliament involved a substantial trimming from the White Paper, excluding the northern and southern fringes of the area, excluding Chester, following the creation of Merseyside, Merseytravel expanded to take in St Helens and Southport. Between 1974 and 1986 the county had a system of local government with the five boroughs sharing power with the Merseyside County Council. However, in 1986 the government of Margaret Thatcher abolished the county council along with all other county councils. The eastern part of Merseyside borders onto Lancashire to the north, Greater Manchester to the east, the territory comprising the county of Merseyside previously formed part of the administrative counties of Lancashire and Cheshire. The two parts are linked by the two Mersey Tunnels, the Wirral Line of Merseyrail, and the Mersey Ferry, to express location within the Merseyside area by the preposition on – thus on Merseyside as opposed to in Merseyside – was traditionally the more usual. Therefore, more recent usage tends to draw distinctions between the geographical Merseyside – for which on is considered appropriate – and the Metropolitan county of Merseyside, Merseyside contains the metropolitan boroughs of Liverpool, Knowsley, Sefton, St. Helens and Wirral. This is a chart of trend of gross value added of Merseyside at current basic prices published by Office for National Statistics with figures in millions of British Pounds Sterling. This also has a usage by some local authorities and organisations and is used by Geographers A-Z Map Company for their Merseyside Street Atlas. However, a separate City region, comprising Merseyside and Halton, has official recognition as being Greater Merseyside. Halton also forms part of the Merseyside NUTS region, List of Lord Lieutenants of Merseyside List of High Sheriffs of Merseyside 1911 Liverpool general transport strike List of Sites of Special Scientific Interest in Merseyside Dickinson, Joseph
10.
Anthony McGill (snooker player)
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Anthony McGill is a Scottish professional snooker player. He is a partner of Alan McManus. McGill turned professional in 2010, after finishing fourth in the 2009/2010 PIOS rankings, McGill won the 2016 Indian Open after having never been beyond the quarter-final stage of a ranking event previously. He was runner-up to Stuart Carrington in the 2006 Junior Pot Black and he was runner-up in the 2008 European Under-19′s Championship behind Stephen Craigie. In the 2009/2010 season he won the event of the International Open Series. Thus, McGill received a place on the professional Main Tour for 2010/2011 and he reached his first professional final losing 1–6 to John Higgins in the 2011 Scottish Professional Championship. McGill did not manage to qualify for the stage of any ranking event tournaments during the season. McGills season concluded with an 8–10 defeat to Anthony Hamilton in the qualifying round for the World Championship. McGill could only qualify for the China Open during the 2012/2013 season and he beat David Grace, Yu Delu and Martin Gould to reach the venue in Beijing, where he defeated Heydari Nezhad Ehsan 5–3 in the wildcard round. He faced Mark Allen in the last 32 and lost 1–5, McGill had a very good season in the Players Tour Championship events by reaching his first ever ranking final in the European Tour Event 5, played in his homeland of Scotland. He saw off the likes of Mark Davis and Robert Milkins to make it through to the quarter-finals where he was 0–3 and 51 points down against Thanawat Thirapongpaiboon to triumph 4–3. He was also 1–3 down in the semis to Andrew Higginson, McGill played Ding Junhui in the final and came up short of winning the title as he lost 2–4. The run helped him to 16th on the PTC Order of Merit to qualify for the Finals, where he beat Milkins 4–2 before once again losing to Ding, this time by a 3–4 scoreline. In the third round of World Championship Qualifying McGill fought back from 3–8 down against Rod Lawler to force a decider which Lawler won, McGill ended the season at number 48 in the world rankings, at that point his highest position. McGill lost in qualifying for the first three events of the season, but at the Indian Open he reached the quarter-finals of a tournament for the first time. He faced Robbie Williams and was whitewashed 4–0, at the minor-ranking Zhengzhou Open he let a 2–0 lead slip in the semi-finals against Liang Wenbo to lose 4–3. McGill was beaten in the last 32 of ranking events on three occasions during the season. McGill began the season with a 5–3 loss to John Higgins in the first round of the Wuxi Classic and he reached the semi-finals of the Riga Open after beating Judd Trump 4–3, but lost in another final frame decider against Mark Allen
England