Jimi Hendrix had a song " If six was nine" from the Axis Bold as Love album.FWIW

Correct, rlhe most certainly didrl.

The line running through the numbers on the RFL picture is because the numbers are on the back of the ball and are being seen through the glass ball. The line is one of the 'panel edges' on the front of the ball. During the live draw when Schofield held up the 9 ball the number was on the front edge of the ball and not viewed through the ball. If you rotated the balls as seen on the RFL picture so that the numbers are on the front edge of the ball then the 6 on the right becomes a 9 with no line under it (like the one in the live draw). The 9 with a line under it (the ball on the left) becomes a 6 with a line on top of it. We didn't see the number on the 6 ball on TV as Murphy had the ball facing the wrong way. He had earlier (seemingly) been told by someone off screen to turn the balls so the number could be seen on the camera close-up (re-watch the draw and you will see this). So they may or may not be the same balls from the draw as differing angles and lighting or being in Murphy's hand at the time may have altered the level of transparency of the glass balls.

As you say it seems like a cock up (misreading a 6 as a 9) was made rather than anything else. With 9 already having been called what else was Murphy going to call the 9/6 that he then drew as, other than 6. It also seems though that the RFL may have made a cock up of covering up for the earlier cock up.

GS is hardly going to call the same number out that has just been called by AM is he )

The flat bottom edge (As per p2) or an underline is a std indicator for seperating 6s and 9s, the balls the RFL showed a pic of are not the same obviously
Why they didn't stick with the old wooden balls with white writing on god only knows..

I think the draw was correct. The balls seemed to represent a 4 panel rugby ball and the way in which it was held to the camera simply showed the top of the number which was refracted along the seam between two of the panels giving the effect of a line!

RL release new pic showing proof no mistake was made

That looks like someone's been busy on Photoshop!

After suffering Wakefields humiliation yesterday, this has made me chuckle.
So thanks to everyone involved

RFL = # couldn't organise a up in a brewery

Easy to see how they could be mistaken.

Perhaps the heat it had been subjected to caused the nine within the ball to temporarily take on a slightly different shape?

I had a good look at the images in software and can find no reason to say they are anything other than the same ball. obviously based on one shaky, not square screen grab that's as far as you can go but no story here for me, though it is amateurish to have equipment that isn't good enough.

Don't beat yourself up about it chief, you've done the best you can with what you have available.

I did actually wonder before I pressed submit whether someone would read it that way, but decided nobody would be that anal!

I did actually wonder before I pressed submit whether someone would read it that way, but decided nobody would be that anal!

Is it due to the lighting as the balls in the RFL's pic seem a different colour and look very dirty, without even analysing the number itself.