International Championship Chengdu China Oct 26 to Nov 2

[lironlad]

"Williams has not beaten O'Sullivan in competition since the 2002 Premier League"

[lironlad]

Mark got the monkey off his back.
But this game is about winning titles. He should win this one , othewise he has done nothing, really....

[Erwan_BZH]

Needless to say Willo was due for a win on this one! Well done

[Masterdoctorgenius]

willo lost many heartbreakes the past years so i am happy for him, second fav player after ronnie.

hope ronnie founds his form. since the players champ through the WC and shanhgai and this event he didnt produce his best like at the welsh and masters. How is it possible to decline so heavy in couple of tournies?

[robertmac]

What a pleasant surprise to learn that Williams
made a great comeback after down the first
few frames. I was watching as O'Sullivan won
the first couple and I thought he would coast
to an easy 6-0 vistory as Williams was floundering
big time. I had to leave but was shocked to see
that he had turned it around.
I would pick Walden for tomorrow and Williams
the following match.
Time will tell tho.

[Odrl]

What a pleasant surprise to learn that Williams
made a great comeback after down the first
few frames. I was watching as O'Sullivan won
the first couple and I thought he would coast
to an easy 6-0 vistory as Williams was floundering
big time.

My thoughts exactly, it looked very early on like Williams had no real belief he would win the match. He wasted a bunch of chances to go 3-0 behind, and basically continued in similar style in the fourth frame as well, but O'Sullivan was poor himself and didn't fully take advantage. After that Williams started playing a bit and grew in confidence, kind of like Liang Wenbo did against O'Sullivan in this tournament last year.

An interesting weekend ahead of us... The rankings suggest Allen and Walden are favourite from here, but I'm sure most people would put Williams in there as well now. :smile:

[Byrom]

Oh I hate to say I told you so but - Well done Willow

[Odrl]

So, only one match tomorrow, Ricky Walden against Robert Milkins...

There is not a lot of history between the two, only two major matches, both very recently, and of course the one that stands out is the 2nd round of the WC in 2013. Milkins had just beaten Robertson in the previous round, but in this match he started poorly and found himself a long way behind. He came back to within a frame in the final session, but Walden held on to win 13-11.

This week I have not seen a lot of them, because their matches either weren't televised, or Eurosport concentrated on the other table. Milkins' run to the semi-finals looks a lot more impressive on paper, wins over Murphy, Fu and Xiao, while Walden beat four real outsiders to get here. But they both played well yesterday... Milkins made a nice break in the decider against Fu, starting with a great long red, and he generally scored well in the frames he won, although there were a couple of scrappy ones too. Walden on the other hand completely outplayed Burnett and had three centuries in the match, two of them in the last two frames.

Walden has more experience in the really big matches, having won two major ranking titles before, both in China, and of course having played in the one-table setup at the Crucible. He is not one of those players who feature at the business end of tournaments all the time, but just when you start to forget about him he plays a good tournament. It would not be like him to suddenly play a poor match now that he is in the semi-finals, so I think Milkins will have to play very well himself. I think he is the more likely of the two to be a little a little nervy, because this is his fifth major semi-final now, and he has never won one. He will know this is a great chance to finally reach a final, because he is not facing a Robertson or a Selby, but rather a player more "in his league".

It should be interesting in any case. A quick, attacking game, and we should see some high breaks along the way. Walden to win 9-7. :smile:

[rich45]

Seriously what is going on with the crowds at this event, or should I say lack of crowd? Semi-final today and there is barely a spectator in sight. Is it the location of the event or what? I thought this was supposed to be the biggest event in Asia. Regardless, I have enjoyed watching so far.....

[DeanH]

you have to love Eurosport
split the snooker by watching a single man cycling around and around and around... for an hour!
and some people call snooker boring!

[Odrl]

Well, that was disappointingly short... I went for a walk earlier, thinking snooker would take up most of the afternoon, but now I find myself with nothing to do all day. :smile:

Great performance from Walden though, he scored very heavily throughout the match, and I can't see him being outclassed in the final if he plays like this. Great chance to win the biggest title of his career so far. :smile:

As for Milkins, good tournament, but he just didn't have that extra gear today. Maybe if he had won that last frame of the first session, when it went down to the final pink, but from 6-2 down he had very little chance.

Should be a better day tomorrow. :smile:

[robertmac]

My internet didnt work all day since early
morning so I wasnt able to login until this
evening. Frustrating to say the least.
I didnt expect Walden to lose and I also
thought he would win easily which he did.
Tomorrow I would expect a much different
and close match and hopefully Williams can
continue his winning ways.

[Odrl]

Tomorrow I would expect a much different
and close match and hopefully Williams can
continue his winning ways.

Yeah, should be a good match.

Unfortunately I have to say again that I haven't seen all that much of these two this week, because Eurosport mainly concentrated on the other table. They didn't even show Williams-Hawkins, but gave priority to Robertson-Swail instead (not such a bad decision in hindsight, but at the time I thought it was poor). What I did see was mostly positive. Allen had to come from behind a couple of times, first against Gould, then against Michael White, and he did it in style with a series of high breaks. In between these two matches he got a good win over Bingham as well. He has been very consistent this season, but he is still waiting for a really big title, and this would be a good one for him.

I only saw Williams play against O'Sullivan, and we all saw the good and the bad there. Obviously if he wants to win tomorrow he will have to play like he did in the second half of that match. The first four frames can't happen again, not at this stage... The problem is, he still plays alright for short periods, but last season he struggled to string more than a few good frames together, and he was very inconsistent from one day to another. I think the longer match here will probably work against him, because Allen is less likely to lose concentration and start missing easy balls.

There is nothing unusual about their head-to-head record. Williams was winning their matches in his better seasons, like his comfortable win in the 2011 World Championship, but Allen had the upper hand in Williams' periods of drought. They've already met twice in China this season, Allen winning on both occasions, including very recently in Shanghai when he won 5-1. This should be another pretty quick and attacking game, between two players who play very similarly, but my feeling is that Allen will be a couple of frames stronger, maybe 9-6. :smile:

[Looki]

Good morning

We've seen some great snooker already today. What worries me is that is the match going to end too soon! First four frames in 45 minutes.

[rich45]

Wow those people taking photos of each other on the front row, even while players are on the shot? Unbelievable.

Close game so far, hoping for a final frame decider this evening and Williams to pinch it.