2017 International Championship

[Odrl]

A strong session from Selby in the morning. If you think back to yesterday, Yan Bingtao made a couple of bad mistakes at the wrong times and went behind immediately, but Selby is just the exact opposite. He recognizes the crucial parts of frames and sessions, and he always takes great care to get the best possible result out of it. I think it will be very difficult for Allen to come back at him in the afternoon, but of course not impossible. :smile:

Looking forward to the commentary from Hendon and Johnson in the second session, to compensate for having to listen to Studd and Hallett in the morning. I mean, in one of the frames Selby made a 50 break, ran out of position and played a safety, then forced another scoring chance and got over the line on his second visit. Studd said it was "the definition of one-visit snooker", which it quite clearly was not. Those are exactly the kind of stupid platitudes I could do without. :wink:

[JimMalone]

Could only see the frames 2 - 6 in the morning session, but with the way Selby is playing and the 6-3-lead it will be very tough for Allen to come back.

[JimMalone]

It seems we just won't get close finals this season. The only real contest so far was the European Masters final between Trump and Bingham.

[jonny66]

It's easy to see Mark winning a couple of frames on the spin to make a match of it, but I suppose Mark could just as easily knock in two frame winning breaks to take the match. Either way I think Mark is going to win it.

[PatBlock]

Allen's done really well to bring it back to just a 3 frame gap, game on again. His break building's been pretty solid so far, just needs to tighten up his safety game a bit,
and if he wins the next one, who knows.

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[JimMalone]

Allen's done really well to bring it back to just a 3 frame gap, game on again. His break building's been pretty solid so far, just needs to tighten up his safety game a bit,
and if he wins the next one, who knows.

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Allen is great, when he is in the balls. But usually Selby should get his chances as well and if he keeps his level he should take them to win the two remaining frames.
But yes, kudos to Allen to make this a contest again.

[PatBlock]

Hmm, not really the time for such brave brown, should've tucked him up. Looks like 9 - 5 now...

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[JimMalone]

Hmm, not really the time for such brave brown, should've tucked him up. Looks like 9 - 5 now...

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And that's one quality that separates the both of them. Selbys shot selection in this match was outstanding again. Always knew, when to quit the break.

[PatBlock]

And that's one quality that separates the both of them. Selbys shot selection in this match was outstanding again. Always knew, when to quit the break.

Exactly, that's been the telling difference today. 9 - 5 now, can't see Selby letting it slip from here.

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[JimMalone]

9-6. So we've become at least a closer contest than it looked for a while and who knows how close it will become in the end.
Important to know for Allen as well that he can win that kind of frames against Selby today.

[JimMalone]

Kind of surprising to see how much troubles Selby has now to finish this game off. Quite unusual for him.

[PatBlock]

Kind of surprising to see how much troubles Selby has now to finish this game off. Quite unusual for him.

Yep. 9 - 7 now, and this is getting interesting. Allen's been good enough, break building wise, to put pressure on Selby, some very surprising misses from him.
Still fancy Selby to take it, but you just never know.

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[PatBlock]

Now that he's getting closer, the pressure swings over to Allen and he's missing balls you'd expect him to get. This is turning out to be a very enjoyable final.

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[motorhead]

Yaaaaaas selby!

[PatBlock]

Another award ceremony that threatens to be longer than the match itself. What on earth is this guy actually saying??

Not too keen on the trophy, a big grey jug. I prefer Allen's runner's up plate tbh. I'm sure the 150,000 ranking pounds will make up for it though.

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