Australia's unpredictable and often controversial number one Quintin Hann has been given permission to contravene the WPBSA dress code at the Liverpool Victoria UK Championship.

With his right foot in plaster from a recent parachute he is playing shoeless snooker.

It does not seem to be doing his game any harm. There is even a theory that it may help him by enabling him to get lower on his shot.

After beating Joe Swail, a world semi finalist last spring 9-7, Hann took an 8-0 overnight lead over Gerard Greene on Sunday to leave himself needing one of Monday morning's nine frames to clinch his place in the quarter finals.

Memory runs back to 1989 when Alex Higgins broke his foot in a fall from a ledge outside the window of his girlfriend's first floor flat.

With remarkable grit he won a match in the European Open, hopping from shot to shot and not long after this, albeit partly recovered, Higgins won the Benson and Hedges Irish Masters, which remains his last title.

Injuries were also a theme on the circuit this summer.

John Higgins broke a wrist in a game of five-a-side football but was fit for the start of the season, Antony Hamilton also broke a wrist trying to prevent a friend being mugged.

His wrist still gives him pain when he uses the rest.

Chris Small, a tall, meticulous Scot, is experiencing recurrent back problems and had to receive treatment during his 9-5 defeat by Mathew Stevens, last years runner up.

It is surprising that more players do not have back problems from spending so many hours in a bent position.

The neck also suffers exceptional stress because players are constantly looking up from that position.

This has caused the early retirement of former world number 12, Martin Clark, whose top vertebrae have worn so badly that he can only play without pain for an hour so. He has become the WPBSA "player liaison officer".