JOHN Astley and Sam Craigie have showed that snooker's future in the North-East is a bright one, after lifting national championships.

Astley took the under 19 title, with Craigie taking the under 14 honour at the English Association of Snooker and Billiards event in Sheffield.

And the North-East could easily have been celebrating four victories - at the same event in Sheffield, David Lilley was unfortunate to lose the English Amateur final, while David Craggs lost out in the semi-final of the National CIU final.

Astley, 19 from Gateshead, proved his standing as one of the nation's up and coming talents, enjoying a big 5- 1 win over Michael Georgiou of London when, after losing the first frame, took the next five in style with a best break of 63.

The frame scores (Astley first) were (1-34), (64-36), (67-38), (67-48), (70-0) and (55-20).

Craigie whitewashed Tom Maxfield of Telford to take revenge for his defeat in last year's under 13's final.

Craigie put in a best break of 49 but commanded the match throughout.

Frame scores (Craigie first) were (79- 9), 49(84-37), (54-19), (63-29).

Lilley lost the English Championship final, going down 8-7 to Martin Gould of Middlesex.

Lilley's best breaks were 72 and 125 before he suffered an unfortunate ending. In the final frame Lilley, of Hebburn, potted brown to pink to leave the match-winning black on the cushion with the cue ball between the pink and black spot.

He cut the black into the corner pocket, punched the air in celebration, then saw the cue ball agonisingly drop into the middle pocket from a very tight angle to somehow hand the title to Gould.

And, by going in after potting the final black in the deciding 15th frame.

Craggs of Tow Law suffered a similar fate in the deciding frame of the semifinal of the National CIU final.

● Astley also won a pro-am event at Wallsend when he beat Brian Lowell of Stanley in the deciding frame of the best of five frames final.

In the semi finals Lovell beat Scott Railton of Consett, whilst Astley beat Neil Raine of Stanley. During the tournament, Astley recorded the top break with a run of 86.

In the Junior event on the previous day, Jordan Watson of Consett recovered from a two frames deficit to beat Stephen Burdis of Wallsend in the deciding frame of the best of five frames final. In the semi-finals Watson beat Phil Marshall of Consett, whilst Burdis beat Robbie Purdham of Stanley.

The next Supa tournament will be held at Stanley where the Junior event needs names registered by 1.30 am tomorrow, with a similar registration time for the Pro-am event on Sunday.

Craggs will be up against one of the world's greats a week on Monday, when he takes on Alex Higgins.

The Hurricane is in the North-East, at Spennymoor Leisure Centre, on Monday, June 11 along with Jimmy White.

The exhibition follows from the success of last month's event featuring Stephen Hendry and Ronnie O'Sullivan - which the latter won 8-1.

Tickets for the night, at £20, are available by calling 01388 815827 or 07974 905147 or by logging onto www.planetsnooker.com