Cross admits no hard feelings

By Phil Lanning

ROB CROSS has revealed there’s “no hard feelings” with England World Cup team-mate Michael Smith after a bizarre fist pump bust-up.

The 2018 World Champion, who beat Jason Lowe 6-3 in the Players Championship yesterday, was knocked out of the Grand Slam last week by Smith in a thrilling deciding leg.

But it ended with words being exchanged on stage after Smith went to fistbump Cross when he hit a good checkout to make it 9-8.

Usually players only fist pump when it goes to a deciding leg and the Hastings player admitted that it confused him.

He said: “It was a really strange one. I didn’t know what was going on, I suddenly thought it was 9-9 instead of 9-8 and I didn’t know why he’d done it.

“There’s no hard feelings whatsoever. He was actually just being a good sportsman, but in the heat of the moment it made me lose my focus. That’s not an excuse, just an explanation of why I was so confused at the end!

“Michael is a brilliant guy. We’ve had two brilliant World Cups as team-mates and spent a lot of time together in Australia. We spoke about it today and there’s no problem. It was just one of those weird moments that caught me out.”

Image credit: Taylor Lanning Photography