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Apologies if there is already a thread for this tournament. It seems like there should be, but I can't see it...
I'm not sure if I should do a little preview of this tournament. It's been turned into a ranking event this season, with fairly big prize money, but unfortunately Hearn's obsession with best-of-7 matches has largely ruined what could have been a great event. Only the semi-finals and the final feature matches of decent length, so the first few days of the tournament will probably feel like a warm-up. Personally, I can't find any satisfactory reason why it couldn't be best-of-9 until the quarter-finals, since we only have 32 players at the venue and all the time in the world... Shame.
On a more positive note, the field is really strong here. It's the 32 players who have earned the most ranking points this season, so the old platitude about there being "no easy draws these days" is actually true this week. O'Sullivan has only just made it by winning the Welsh Open, Maguire has squeezed in as number 32, and Ding has made it as well. This means that the only really big name missing this week is Ricky Walden.
Let's see what the draw looks like...
Quarter 1:
John Higgins v. Stephen Maguire
Matthew Selt v. Ryan Day
Judd Trump v. Mark Williams
David Gilbert v. Stuart Bingham
The first quarter is very strong, mainly because of the players who have found themselves among the lower seeds here. John Higgins is the top seed, as the player who has earned more ranking points than anyone else this season, but it's worth noting that most of those points come from events before the new year, whereas the last two months have been less successful for him. A year ago it was a best-of-7 event that started his resurgence, but now that he has found some consistency, I think the short format actually works against him. He is playing the 32nd seed, who should be the easiest possible opponent on paper, but in reality Stephen Maguire is a pretty harsh draw. Maguire has played at the business end of two major events this season, but didn't really come close to winning either of them. He is still reasonably consistent, in the sense that he rarely strings together a number of early exits in a row, but he is not among the main contenders for titles at the moment. He has lost most of the big matches against Higgins in the past, but he still has a positive record against him overall, and it's interesting that he has won 8 of the their last 9 matches. He also has a fantastic record against Ryan Day, so he could be a danger this week. I actually predicted Higgins to meet Day in the quarter-finals of the Welsh Open, but they were both knocked out before that stage. It's quite realistic that they could meet here, although Day has never really done anything notable in tournaments in Wales, and he seems to play his best snooker in Germany and China these days. Matthew Selt is the fourth contender in this section, also well capable of going through. His best result in a major event so far is a quarter-final, and the first time he reached that stage was in the 2011 Australian Open, where he actually beat Higgins from 4-1 down along the way. He already has two major quarter-finals this season, which is something he had never done in the past, and he has every chance to add another good run or two. Personally, I would go for Higgins in this section, but with Maguire's head-to-head against two of his opponents here, he could be a decent bet as well.
The next section is a little peculiar. David Gilbert is surrounded by three really big names, but it's actually he that is the highest seed here. That's mostly down to his appearance in the final of the International Championship this season, which is so far his only run past the last16 in any major event. He shouldn't be underestimated of course, but it does seem like he is the underdog here. Stuart Bingham will be his 1st round opponent. The expectations were high for the World champion, but he hasn't been able to produce the kind of form that won him the World title so far this season. Still, the season hasn't been a total disaster for him, with two major semi-finals, and he still has a couple of events to redeem himself in, including a trip to China where he has had a lot of success in recent years. You could say Judd Trump is the defending champion here, although the World Grand Prix was not held as a ranking event last year. It's actually the most recent major event Trump has won, so it's been a disappointing year for him, at least in terms of titles. His consistency, on the other hand, has been quite impressive, and he now finds himself at the business end of most tournaments he plays in. He also doesn't seem to mind playing in the short matches, and he has recently won the Championship League for the third time in his career, so I would imagine he is optimistic ahead of this week. Also here is Mark Williams, predictably facing Trump in the 1st round, in a meeting between two players who have enjoyed a great rivalry over the last year or so. Both have won their share of matches, but the quality hasn't always been great. Williams was alright in the recent Welsh Open, his best tournament in a long time, although his best result of the season came in Shanghai in September, a quarter-final. It was Trump who knocked him out of that tournament, 5-1, and Trump also went on to beat Bingham 6-3 in the semi-finals, to get a little bit of revenge for losing to Bingham 17-16 in an excellent semi-final at the Crucible last year. All three are capable of playing great snooker on their day, but it's Trump who has the consistency at the moment, so he would be my pick to come through.
Quarter 2:
Mark Selby v. Tom Ford
Luca Brecel v. Allister Carter
Joe Perry v. Barry Hawkins
Kyren Wilson v. Jamie Jones
Mark Selby won the Gdynia Open a week ago, but hasn't won a major event for almost a year now, which is most surprising. He has two major semi-finals this season, in both best-of-11 ranking events, but everything else has been mediocre. Luckily he has one of the easier draws here, Tom Ford, who has managed to qualify for this event mostly thanks to a run to a PTC final and a decent showing at the UK Championship. I would not expect Ford to give Selby much trouble. The other pair, however, is more interesting. Luca Brecel has been in good form recently, stringing three good tournaments together, including a run to the final of the German Masters last month. He beat Selby in the Welsh Open last season, which was a big surprise at the time, but the two players are much more evenly matched these days. Selby did win when they played in Gdynia a week ago though. Selby also has a lot of history with Ali Carter, although no major matches since the 2014 World Championship. Carter hasn't been a major factor in snooker in recent times, apart from winning a PTC in August, but he is bound to return to form at some point, and when he does, he is well capable of winning tournaments such as this one. As I said, his match against Brecel could be one of the more interesting ones in the 1st round here, but I think Brecel is the better player at this point in time, so I think the Belgian is Selby's highest obstacle in this section. I will still go for Selby to come through though.
The next section is quite difficult to predict, with four fairly strong players, but no really big names. Kyren Wilson is seeded 4th for this tournament, enjoying by far the best season of his career so far. He won the title in Shanghai, reached the semi-finals in Berlin, and also did quite well to reach the semi-finals of the PTC in Gdynia just recently. I kind of expected him to have a quiet period after his Shanghai win, but he has continued to play like a top player throughout the season, and it won't be long before his ranking catches up with his performances. He opens with a match against Jamie Jones here, an opponent he has never met outside of the PTC events. Jones did go through a quiet period after his major success in the 2012 World Championship, and it took him a while to come back to form, but it's finally happened for him this season with a run to the semi-finals in Australia. Unfortunately he hasn't done much since the new year, so he is probably the underdog in this section. Barry Hawkins hasn't appeared in a single major ranking quarter-final all season, but it's not been all bad for him. He won a PTC event in the summer, and he also reached the final of the Masters in January, beating Joe Perry on his way. Hawkins also prevailed when they met in Gdynia a week ago. Perry has had a much more consistent season though, including a run to the semi-finals of the recent Welsh Open. This is the third season in a row where Perry has featured heavily, at the age of 41 now, and it would be no surprise to see him come through here. It's interesting though, Wilson has already beaten both Hawkins and Perry this season, in the Gdynia Open and the Shanghai Masters respectively. Will experience prevail this time, or will it be one of the younger players that goes through? As I said, this one is difficult to predict, but I will go with Perry.
Quarter 3:
Martin Gould v. Tian Pengfei
Shaun Murphy v. Michael White
Ronnie O'Sullivan v. Michael Holt
Liang Wenbo v. Graeme Dott
Martin Gould is the 3rd seed this week, one of the best players in the world this season. He has basically only played one bad tournament, the International Championship in October, while everything else has been very solid from him, including the German Masters title and the final in Australia. The best-of-7 format has usually been a good one for him, and it helps that his 1st round draw here is among the easier ones. Tian Pengfei is his opponent, a player who has never played at the business end of any major tournament, but got into this event with the help of a run to a PTC final this season. He was a very promising player a few years ago, but it's only recently that he is regaining some of his old form, kind of like Jones. I don't think he is likely to beat Gould though. The other two players in this section look more dangerous. Shaun Murphy is of course the biggest name, but he too only has a PTC final to his name this season, while his performances in the major events have been very poor. In fact, he hasn't reached a major quarter-final at all since last year's World Championship, which is a dreadful statistic for a player like Murphy. On the plus side, he enjoys a very good record against Gould, so I wouldn't write him off just yet. Also here is Michael White, another PTC finalist this season, but he does have a few decent results in the major events as well, including two quarter-finals. The last of those was in the Welsh Open, a tournament that ended on a very low note for him, with a 5-0 whitewash against Mark Allen. White showed a lot of mental weakness in that match, so hopefully he has reflected on things and he comes to the next big match better prepared. I'm looking forward to his match against Murphy here. As for the most likely quarter-finalist in this section, it has to be Gould, doesn't it? He led Trump 5-1 in the semi-finals last year, but somehow managed to lose the match, so this is a chance to redeem himself.
Ronnie O'Sullivan is the big name in the third quarter. He has only played in a couple of events this season, but winning the Welsh Open was enough for him to qualify for this event. He also won the Masters in January, and just a few days ago lost in the final of the Championship League, which means he has done very well in almost every event he's played in. He is surely among the big favourites for the title this week as well. He hasn't played Michael Holt in almost a decade, so this match should be interesting to see. Holt hasn't had any notable runs this season, but he has won at least one match in every event, and without checking, I imagine the group of players who have done that is very small. But unless he beats O'Sullivan here, that run will come to an end. Holt is a very capable player of course, but O'Sullivan has been very reliable recently, so I don't think Holt is likely to trouble him. Liang Wenbo could be a bigger challenge for O'Sullivan. His form this season has been much better than Holt's, especially during his excellent run to the UK final, and he has also beaten O'Sullivan the last time they met in a major match, 6-4 in the 2013 International Championship, from 4-1 down. They've actually played each other quite a lot over the years, mostly in the longer matches, and needles to say, it's O'Sullivan who has had more success. Graeme Dott has also played fairly well this season, the highlight being his run to the semi-finals of the German Masters. It's interesting, Liang has won exactly three frames in every one of his previous matches against Dott, but lost them all, which suggests he might lose this one 4-3. And if we base our predictions on trivial statistics, it's also worth mentioning that Dott beat Liang in this tournament last year, then lost to O'Sullivan in the following round. A repeat of the same scenario looks quite plausible here.
Quarter 4:
Mark Allen v. David Grace
Marco Fu v. Thepchaiya Un-Nooh
Ben Woollaston v. Ding Junhui
Neil Robertson v. Peter Ebdon
Mark Allen is an interesting player here. He is seeded 7th in this event, despite the fact that his run to the final of the Champion of Champions doesn't count towards the rankings. I always have the feeling that his results are somewhat disappointing, perhaps because he always seems to lose early when I have him in my fantasy team, but he has actually had quite a good and consistent season. He has reached the semi-finals of two major ranking events, including the recent Welsh Open, where he couldn't really have had a tougher draw. This time he has it much easier, facing the outsider David Grace in the 1st round, an opponent he has already beaten comfortably this season, 5-1 in the Shanghai Masters. Grace was of course a very surprising finalist in the UK Championship, his first and only notable result in snooker. Marco Fu is much more likely to trouble Allen here. It's a match I would quite like to see, because they've had a number of really good matches between them in the past, but they haven't met at all in the more recent times. Fu has played his best snooker of the season in the two best-of-11 ranking events, reaching the quarter-finals both times. He has not been too bad in the best-of-7 format either. He won a PTC title in December, and he also did quite well in the Welsh Open, but he was unlucky to come up against Robertson earlier than he would have liked. Thepchaiya Un-Nooh is his 1st round opponent here, a player we have seen quite a lot of this season. His run to the semi-finals of the International Championship was particularly impressive, as he had 6-5 wins in every round, including against Allen in the quarter-finals. I think the two main contenders in this section are extremely evenly matched, but since I have made a specific prediction in every other section so far, I will do so here as well and go for Fu to come through.
And finally, a very interesting section to conclude with. Let's mention Neil Robertson first. He is the only player close to Higgins in ranking points this season, and miles ahead of everyone else. On top of that, he has also won a major non-ranking tournament, so he is clearly one of the men to beat at this point in time. I'm not sure what his confidence is like at the moment though, after losing the Welsh Open final from a very strong position. There is no doubt he is vulnerable in the short matches, and it doesn't help that his 1st round opponent here is also his bogey player. Peter Ebdon is not a fan of short matches himself, but this format does favour the less consistent players, and Ebdon reached a rare quarter-final here last year. He had a run of five major wins against Robertson in a row, all in China, before Robertson finally beat him in the UK Championship last season. Since this match is played in the UK, Ebdon winning would be a surprise. One player who does have a good record against Ebdon is Ding Junhui, the other big name in this section. It was nice to see him playing well again in Cardiff, and his match against Robertson in particular was very enjoyable. Robertson won it 5-2, which was not unexpected considering the recent form of both players, but their overall head-to-head is actually very close, and an in-form Ding would be a high obstacle for Robertson to overcome. He has managed two major quarter-finals this season, which is not really great for a player of his class, but it's still a lot better than the likes of Murphy, for example. Ben Woollaston is another quarter-finalist from Cardiff, and quite a formidable opponent for anyone these days, especially for inconsistent players such as Ding. It's a tough ask to beat Ding and Robertson back to back though, so I will go for Robertson in this section.
Possible QF line-up:
John Higgins v. Judd Trump
Mark Selby v. Joe Perry
Martin Gould v. Ronnie O'Sullivan
Marco Fu v. Neil Robertson
So there we are. Despite the short format, there are hardly any matches that look unexciting here, so it should be a decent week of snooker. :smile:
I'm not sure if I should do a little preview of this tournament. It's been turned into a ranking event this season, with fairly big prize money, but unfortunately Hearn's obsession with best-of-7 matches has largely ruined what could have been a great event. Only the semi-finals and the final feature matches of decent length, so the first few days of the tournament will probably feel like a warm-up. Personally, I can't find any satisfactory reason why it couldn't be best-of-9 until the quarter-finals, since we only have 32 players at the venue and all the time in the world... Shame.
On a more positive note, the field is really strong here. It's the 32 players who have earned the most ranking points this season, so the old platitude about there being "no easy draws these days" is actually true this week. O'Sullivan has only just made it by winning the Welsh Open, Maguire has squeezed in as number 32, and Ding has made it as well. This means that the only really big name missing this week is Ricky Walden.
Let's see what the draw looks like...
Quarter 1:
John Higgins v. Stephen Maguire
Matthew Selt v. Ryan Day
Judd Trump v. Mark Williams
David Gilbert v. Stuart Bingham
The first quarter is very strong, mainly because of the players who have found themselves among the lower seeds here. John Higgins is the top seed, as the player who has earned more ranking points than anyone else this season, but it's worth noting that most of those points come from events before the new year, whereas the last two months have been less successful for him. A year ago it was a best-of-7 event that started his resurgence, but now that he has found some consistency, I think the short format actually works against him. He is playing the 32nd seed, who should be the easiest possible opponent on paper, but in reality Stephen Maguire is a pretty harsh draw. Maguire has played at the business end of two major events this season, but didn't really come close to winning either of them. He is still reasonably consistent, in the sense that he rarely strings together a number of early exits in a row, but he is not among the main contenders for titles at the moment. He has lost most of the big matches against Higgins in the past, but he still has a positive record against him overall, and it's interesting that he has won 8 of the their last 9 matches. He also has a fantastic record against Ryan Day, so he could be a danger this week. I actually predicted Higgins to meet Day in the quarter-finals of the Welsh Open, but they were both knocked out before that stage. It's quite realistic that they could meet here, although Day has never really done anything notable in tournaments in Wales, and he seems to play his best snooker in Germany and China these days. Matthew Selt is the fourth contender in this section, also well capable of going through. His best result in a major event so far is a quarter-final, and the first time he reached that stage was in the 2011 Australian Open, where he actually beat Higgins from 4-1 down along the way. He already has two major quarter-finals this season, which is something he had never done in the past, and he has every chance to add another good run or two. Personally, I would go for Higgins in this section, but with Maguire's head-to-head against two of his opponents here, he could be a decent bet as well.
The next section is a little peculiar. David Gilbert is surrounded by three really big names, but it's actually he that is the highest seed here. That's mostly down to his appearance in the final of the International Championship this season, which is so far his only run past the last16 in any major event. He shouldn't be underestimated of course, but it does seem like he is the underdog here. Stuart Bingham will be his 1st round opponent. The expectations were high for the World champion, but he hasn't been able to produce the kind of form that won him the World title so far this season. Still, the season hasn't been a total disaster for him, with two major semi-finals, and he still has a couple of events to redeem himself in, including a trip to China where he has had a lot of success in recent years. You could say Judd Trump is the defending champion here, although the World Grand Prix was not held as a ranking event last year. It's actually the most recent major event Trump has won, so it's been a disappointing year for him, at least in terms of titles. His consistency, on the other hand, has been quite impressive, and he now finds himself at the business end of most tournaments he plays in. He also doesn't seem to mind playing in the short matches, and he has recently won the Championship League for the third time in his career, so I would imagine he is optimistic ahead of this week. Also here is Mark Williams, predictably facing Trump in the 1st round, in a meeting between two players who have enjoyed a great rivalry over the last year or so. Both have won their share of matches, but the quality hasn't always been great. Williams was alright in the recent Welsh Open, his best tournament in a long time, although his best result of the season came in Shanghai in September, a quarter-final. It was Trump who knocked him out of that tournament, 5-1, and Trump also went on to beat Bingham 6-3 in the semi-finals, to get a little bit of revenge for losing to Bingham 17-16 in an excellent semi-final at the Crucible last year. All three are capable of playing great snooker on their day, but it's Trump who has the consistency at the moment, so he would be my pick to come through.
Quarter 2:
Mark Selby v. Tom Ford
Luca Brecel v. Allister Carter
Joe Perry v. Barry Hawkins
Kyren Wilson v. Jamie Jones
Mark Selby won the Gdynia Open a week ago, but hasn't won a major event for almost a year now, which is most surprising. He has two major semi-finals this season, in both best-of-11 ranking events, but everything else has been mediocre. Luckily he has one of the easier draws here, Tom Ford, who has managed to qualify for this event mostly thanks to a run to a PTC final and a decent showing at the UK Championship. I would not expect Ford to give Selby much trouble. The other pair, however, is more interesting. Luca Brecel has been in good form recently, stringing three good tournaments together, including a run to the final of the German Masters last month. He beat Selby in the Welsh Open last season, which was a big surprise at the time, but the two players are much more evenly matched these days. Selby did win when they played in Gdynia a week ago though. Selby also has a lot of history with Ali Carter, although no major matches since the 2014 World Championship. Carter hasn't been a major factor in snooker in recent times, apart from winning a PTC in August, but he is bound to return to form at some point, and when he does, he is well capable of winning tournaments such as this one. As I said, his match against Brecel could be one of the more interesting ones in the 1st round here, but I think Brecel is the better player at this point in time, so I think the Belgian is Selby's highest obstacle in this section. I will still go for Selby to come through though.
The next section is quite difficult to predict, with four fairly strong players, but no really big names. Kyren Wilson is seeded 4th for this tournament, enjoying by far the best season of his career so far. He won the title in Shanghai, reached the semi-finals in Berlin, and also did quite well to reach the semi-finals of the PTC in Gdynia just recently. I kind of expected him to have a quiet period after his Shanghai win, but he has continued to play like a top player throughout the season, and it won't be long before his ranking catches up with his performances. He opens with a match against Jamie Jones here, an opponent he has never met outside of the PTC events. Jones did go through a quiet period after his major success in the 2012 World Championship, and it took him a while to come back to form, but it's finally happened for him this season with a run to the semi-finals in Australia. Unfortunately he hasn't done much since the new year, so he is probably the underdog in this section. Barry Hawkins hasn't appeared in a single major ranking quarter-final all season, but it's not been all bad for him. He won a PTC event in the summer, and he also reached the final of the Masters in January, beating Joe Perry on his way. Hawkins also prevailed when they met in Gdynia a week ago. Perry has had a much more consistent season though, including a run to the semi-finals of the recent Welsh Open. This is the third season in a row where Perry has featured heavily, at the age of 41 now, and it would be no surprise to see him come through here. It's interesting though, Wilson has already beaten both Hawkins and Perry this season, in the Gdynia Open and the Shanghai Masters respectively. Will experience prevail this time, or will it be one of the younger players that goes through? As I said, this one is difficult to predict, but I will go with Perry.
Quarter 3:
Martin Gould v. Tian Pengfei
Shaun Murphy v. Michael White
Ronnie O'Sullivan v. Michael Holt
Liang Wenbo v. Graeme Dott
Martin Gould is the 3rd seed this week, one of the best players in the world this season. He has basically only played one bad tournament, the International Championship in October, while everything else has been very solid from him, including the German Masters title and the final in Australia. The best-of-7 format has usually been a good one for him, and it helps that his 1st round draw here is among the easier ones. Tian Pengfei is his opponent, a player who has never played at the business end of any major tournament, but got into this event with the help of a run to a PTC final this season. He was a very promising player a few years ago, but it's only recently that he is regaining some of his old form, kind of like Jones. I don't think he is likely to beat Gould though. The other two players in this section look more dangerous. Shaun Murphy is of course the biggest name, but he too only has a PTC final to his name this season, while his performances in the major events have been very poor. In fact, he hasn't reached a major quarter-final at all since last year's World Championship, which is a dreadful statistic for a player like Murphy. On the plus side, he enjoys a very good record against Gould, so I wouldn't write him off just yet. Also here is Michael White, another PTC finalist this season, but he does have a few decent results in the major events as well, including two quarter-finals. The last of those was in the Welsh Open, a tournament that ended on a very low note for him, with a 5-0 whitewash against Mark Allen. White showed a lot of mental weakness in that match, so hopefully he has reflected on things and he comes to the next big match better prepared. I'm looking forward to his match against Murphy here. As for the most likely quarter-finalist in this section, it has to be Gould, doesn't it? He led Trump 5-1 in the semi-finals last year, but somehow managed to lose the match, so this is a chance to redeem himself.
Ronnie O'Sullivan is the big name in the third quarter. He has only played in a couple of events this season, but winning the Welsh Open was enough for him to qualify for this event. He also won the Masters in January, and just a few days ago lost in the final of the Championship League, which means he has done very well in almost every event he's played in. He is surely among the big favourites for the title this week as well. He hasn't played Michael Holt in almost a decade, so this match should be interesting to see. Holt hasn't had any notable runs this season, but he has won at least one match in every event, and without checking, I imagine the group of players who have done that is very small. But unless he beats O'Sullivan here, that run will come to an end. Holt is a very capable player of course, but O'Sullivan has been very reliable recently, so I don't think Holt is likely to trouble him. Liang Wenbo could be a bigger challenge for O'Sullivan. His form this season has been much better than Holt's, especially during his excellent run to the UK final, and he has also beaten O'Sullivan the last time they met in a major match, 6-4 in the 2013 International Championship, from 4-1 down. They've actually played each other quite a lot over the years, mostly in the longer matches, and needles to say, it's O'Sullivan who has had more success. Graeme Dott has also played fairly well this season, the highlight being his run to the semi-finals of the German Masters. It's interesting, Liang has won exactly three frames in every one of his previous matches against Dott, but lost them all, which suggests he might lose this one 4-3. And if we base our predictions on trivial statistics, it's also worth mentioning that Dott beat Liang in this tournament last year, then lost to O'Sullivan in the following round. A repeat of the same scenario looks quite plausible here.
Quarter 4:
Mark Allen v. David Grace
Marco Fu v. Thepchaiya Un-Nooh
Ben Woollaston v. Ding Junhui
Neil Robertson v. Peter Ebdon
Mark Allen is an interesting player here. He is seeded 7th in this event, despite the fact that his run to the final of the Champion of Champions doesn't count towards the rankings. I always have the feeling that his results are somewhat disappointing, perhaps because he always seems to lose early when I have him in my fantasy team, but he has actually had quite a good and consistent season. He has reached the semi-finals of two major ranking events, including the recent Welsh Open, where he couldn't really have had a tougher draw. This time he has it much easier, facing the outsider David Grace in the 1st round, an opponent he has already beaten comfortably this season, 5-1 in the Shanghai Masters. Grace was of course a very surprising finalist in the UK Championship, his first and only notable result in snooker. Marco Fu is much more likely to trouble Allen here. It's a match I would quite like to see, because they've had a number of really good matches between them in the past, but they haven't met at all in the more recent times. Fu has played his best snooker of the season in the two best-of-11 ranking events, reaching the quarter-finals both times. He has not been too bad in the best-of-7 format either. He won a PTC title in December, and he also did quite well in the Welsh Open, but he was unlucky to come up against Robertson earlier than he would have liked. Thepchaiya Un-Nooh is his 1st round opponent here, a player we have seen quite a lot of this season. His run to the semi-finals of the International Championship was particularly impressive, as he had 6-5 wins in every round, including against Allen in the quarter-finals. I think the two main contenders in this section are extremely evenly matched, but since I have made a specific prediction in every other section so far, I will do so here as well and go for Fu to come through.
And finally, a very interesting section to conclude with. Let's mention Neil Robertson first. He is the only player close to Higgins in ranking points this season, and miles ahead of everyone else. On top of that, he has also won a major non-ranking tournament, so he is clearly one of the men to beat at this point in time. I'm not sure what his confidence is like at the moment though, after losing the Welsh Open final from a very strong position. There is no doubt he is vulnerable in the short matches, and it doesn't help that his 1st round opponent here is also his bogey player. Peter Ebdon is not a fan of short matches himself, but this format does favour the less consistent players, and Ebdon reached a rare quarter-final here last year. He had a run of five major wins against Robertson in a row, all in China, before Robertson finally beat him in the UK Championship last season. Since this match is played in the UK, Ebdon winning would be a surprise. One player who does have a good record against Ebdon is Ding Junhui, the other big name in this section. It was nice to see him playing well again in Cardiff, and his match against Robertson in particular was very enjoyable. Robertson won it 5-2, which was not unexpected considering the recent form of both players, but their overall head-to-head is actually very close, and an in-form Ding would be a high obstacle for Robertson to overcome. He has managed two major quarter-finals this season, which is not really great for a player of his class, but it's still a lot better than the likes of Murphy, for example. Ben Woollaston is another quarter-finalist from Cardiff, and quite a formidable opponent for anyone these days, especially for inconsistent players such as Ding. It's a tough ask to beat Ding and Robertson back to back though, so I will go for Robertson in this section.
Possible QF line-up:
John Higgins v. Judd Trump
Mark Selby v. Joe Perry
Martin Gould v. Ronnie O'Sullivan
Marco Fu v. Neil Robertson
So there we are. Despite the short format, there are hardly any matches that look unexciting here, so it should be a decent week of snooker. :smile:
- I think I'll need some luck this week to get some points back!
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