Jones Wins Maiden Junior Crown

Edward Jones defeated Jake Crofts 3-1 at The Crucible Club in Newbury to win the third English Junior Tour title of the season.

• Results

The victory marked the first English Junior Tour title of Jones’ career as the 17-year-old became the first non-seeded champion of the 2025/26 campaign.

Jones made a slow start to the opening day as he fell to a 2-1 defeat to 16-year-old Thomas Mcevoy, but back-to-back whitewash victories over Arthur Champion-Davies and Jacob Corbett earned the teenager a place in the final day.

O’Shay Scott was Jones’ first opponent on the Sunday and the seeded player kicked off in style with a tournament high break of 107.

From there, however, Jones stepped up a gear to win six consecutive frames – coming from behind to beat Scott 2-1 before overcoming both Kian Dennett and Zoard Toth by a 2-0 scoreline to secure his place in the quarter-finals.

A tough route to the title match saw Jones having to defeat reigning English Under-16 champion Shaun Liu in a deciding frame before repeating the feat against event one winner Ethan Llewellyn with a top break of 52.

Meeting him in the final was 20-year-old Crofts, who had also reached the final stage as a non-seeded player and last downed Dylan Smith 3-0 to join Jones.

A tight opener was taken by Crofts on the final black but breaks of 38 and 57 saw Jones take the next two frames and move within one of victory.

Jones showed no sign of nerves at the vital moment and a further contribution of 53 in the fourth frame gave the 17-year-old his maiden English Junior Tour title.

The English Junior Tour continues on 13-14 December at the Northern Snooker Centre in Leeds. Enter now via WPBSA SnookerScores.