Who has entered Q School Snooker 2025? Information on the events in the UK and Asia
The annual Q Schools are upon us once again as amateur hopefuls from across a plethora of nations attempt to win lucrative tickets to the professional World Snooker Tour.
As the case has been for the past few years, there will be two separate Q School locations - one taking place in England, and the other in Thailand. Open to all amateurs, players are only allowed to enter one of the locations.
Both Q Schools will each hold two straight-knockout tournaments, with best of seven frame matches throughout.
The 2025 UK-Europe Q School will be held at the Mattioli Arena in Leicester between May 21st to June 1st where there will be eight tour cards on offer - to the four semi-finalists of each tournament.
There is set to be a cosmopolitan vibe at the Mattioli with players representing 21 different countries/regions from as far as Spain to South Korea, Brazil to Bulgaria.
Several players who have recently been relegated from the professional circuit are in the draw, such as Ian Burns, Alexander Ursenbacher, David Grace, Stuart Carrington and Andrew Higginson, to name a few.
The most famous name set for action is 53-year-old Anthony Hamilton; the former top 16 star and German Masters champion was recently relegated from the sport's top tier for the first time since turning pro in 1991, although the Englishman is aiming to bounce back immediately.
Tour relegation confirmed for Anthony Hamilton as he goes down 10-3 to Matthew Selt. We'll see if he does go to Q School but another fantastic career potentially set to end this year. Ever-present on tour since 1991 #TourSurvival
— Matt (@ProSnookerBlog) April 14, 2025
Several of Hamilton's contemporaries have also put their names into the hat - Barry Pinches, Peter Lines, Gerard Greene and Rory McLeod - while stars from the 1980s Dean Reynolds and Tony Knowles try to relive past glories on the baize.
But there is also a pool of exciting young talent scheduled for action, such as teenagers Shaun Liu from Hong Kong, and Vladislav Gradinari from Moldova.
The 2025 Asia-Oceania Q School will be played at the Kiatthada Billiards & Snooker Club in Bangkok between May 13th to 24th, with four tour cards on offer - to the finalists of both events. It is good to see this being held slightly earlier than in previous years, giving the graduates a bit more time to make plans for the pro tour, with action on the premier circuit to begin in June.
The events are set to be hotly contested, with several players who have just fallen off the World Snooker Tour electing to travel to South-East Asia instead of staying in the UK. The field includes Malaysia's Thor Chuan Leong, and China's Tian Pengfei, who was a professional ranking event semi-finalist in 2023.
One of the most interesting entries is India's highly-decorated and multi-talented Pankaj Advani, who was a professional several years ago before resigning his tour card so he could concentrate on his primary passion of English Billiards.
All the tour card winners from this year's Q Schools receive a minimum of two seasons on the professional circuit for the 2025/26 and 2026/27 campaigns.