Final Qualifying Round review

[The Statman]

Having spent a very enjoyable weekend in Sheffield, and knowing that these are not matches that are easy to find details on, I thought you would like a report on what I made of the matches.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the setup, there are 6 tables and spectators can move at will to concentrate on any match they like, and from the back rows three tables are visible. I did flit about a lot so I have not got first-hand knowledge of all of them, but I have the scoreboard readouts to help.

Stuart Bingham 10-2 Alan McManus
McManus won the first frame, belying the drubbing that would unfold. In several of the frames McManus had first openings and, in four frames in the opening session he was on the brink of victory only to lose to a Bingham comeback: in the 3rd he was first in with 44 only for Bingham to reply with 70; in the fifth McManuns's 51 was superseded on the black by Bingham's 61; and McManus should have had the last two of the session having opened with respective contributions of 45 and 51 only to let Bingham back in and eventually steal them both. Resuming 8-1 ahead, Bingham knocked in a 114 and the rot was stopped only briefly by McManus's 78 before Bingham claimed victory with a smashing 126 break in the twelfth.

Stephen Lee 10-2 Steve Davis
Quite simply, Davis couldn't get any rhythm going. Lee was in first in the opener with 35; Davis replied with 32 but later lost the frame and this set the pattern for the opening session. Davis was first in with 25 or 30, or replied with such after Lee had broken down, in each of the next three and Lee gained momentum as Davis's fizzled out. He did snatch the last of the session thanks mainly to a 37, equalling his highest break of the match. The second session was a carbon copy of the Bingham-McManus scenario, Davis's only success being a lovely 57 clearance sandwiched between a 105 and the 89 from Lee, which latter took him over the line 10-2.

Ken Doherty 6-10 Jimmy Robertson
The early part of this match was characterised by solid but not earth-shattering snooker on both sides. 40s and 50s from both players were the order of the day until Robertson levelled at 2-2 with a 91 and, after the interval, Doherty claimed a two-frame lead with back-to-back centuries. An early 63 proved key to his extending that lead in the seventh before the last two frames were shared with Robertson's 78 and Doherty's 52 to give him a healthy 6-3 session lead. On the reumption, though, it was a different script. Doherty suddenly could do no right and Robertson fed from it, by no means infallibly but with the amount of slack his opponent cut him he did enough to go through to the Crucible with no further loss. The score-sheet hints at Doherty's sudden collapse with the number of single-digit contributions he provided. His highest break was the 27 which initiated the scoring in the eleventh frame - it followed a half-century from Robertson and Doherty's only hope seemed to be any hesitatncy from Robertson as this significant finishing line approached. Robertson, though, was not playing poorly enough to affect his nerves and Doherty not well enough to test them.

Barry Hawkins 10-5 Anthony Hamilton
I had not appreciated how slow Hamilton's painstaking deliberation had become. His was comfortably the last match to finish at this stage of the competition in 2007 and, if this match had run closer, it might have surpassed that 1am finish. In fact, it still might have done had it not been played on the table that was spare in the afternoon session, meaning they could overrun their morning by as much as was required rather than be pulled off at 4-3. The first six frames were in fact not overlong at 20-25 minutes each, and they were shared 3-all by fairly good stuff - including a 103 by Hamilton to win the second. The seventh, though, was long-winded and if referee Terry Camilleri had taken three seconds longer to stop the scoreboard it would have been recorded as an hour-long frame. Hawkins won it with a pink and black clearance and, although Hamilton dictated the eighth Hawkins found a 5-4 lead at the end of the session. Hamilton's 84 in the eleventh frame came between a couple of 60s from Hawkins which accounted for the tenth and twelfth, before an extraordinary thirteenth frame which may have extinguished any fightback that Hamilton, now 7-5 down, could muster. As I re-entered the arena Hamilton led 56-30 and was snookered on the green, there were 51 minutes on the clock already and he was taking seemingly an age to decide how to play the simplest of one-cushion escapes. I only later heard that Hamilton had led 56-22 on the colours and that Hawkins had gained a 6-point foul and potted the yellow. Hamilton successfully negotiated this simple snooker but, after Hawkins had potted the green, he extracted the further snooker he required and with an excellent brown and good longish pots on blue, pink and black, entered the eagerly awaited interval with an 8-5 instead of only 7-6 lead. The frame comfortably unseated their earlier hour-long frame as the longest of the day by almost 13 minutes. After another hour's play Hawkins had won the two further frames he needed with a top effort of 52.

That is the end of the first instalment. More will follow later or, possibly, tomorrow.

[The Statman]

Andrew Higginson 6-10 Andrew Pagett
This match was on the adjacent table to Doherty-Robertson and ran similarly throughout. Higginson's 52 in the opener was the highest break of the first four frames, although it was Pagett actually who won the first on the black. Higginson similarly shaded the second and the pattern of alternating frames was carried through to 3-3 with Higginson's 70, the first substantial contribution of the match - it would transpire to be his highest break. His 69 settled the seventh and he also won the next in dribs and drabs before Pagett closed to 4-5 with a best effort of 33 in the ninth. An early 50 from Higginson on the resumption brought a concession from Pagett after the last red, but this would turn out to be Higginson's last frame win as he somehow started to really struggle just as we were watching Ken Doherty do the same on the neighbouring table. Higginson was in first in the eleventh with 43 but Pagett came in with his highest break of the contest, 79, to narrow the gap to a frame and equalled at 6-all thanks to an early 60. Higginson's four scoring openings in the thirteenth amounted to just 37 points and Pagett nicked it on the pink; Pagett opened the scoring in the next with 35 but Higginson's two scoring visits only matched that figure before Pagett secured it with a 31; and Higginson scored only one more point in the match as Pagett reached his Crucible début with further contributions of 62, 64 and 40.

Gerard Greene 9-10 Dave Harold
I find these two interesting characters - Harold because of his astonishing cue action and Green, well I don't know, he always seems to have the expression that things are going against him when they're perhaps not as bad as all that. And so it was nice to see him pull back to force a decider from 7-9 down - but we'll come to that in a moment.
I saw little of the opening session. Greene accounted for the first two frames with 51 and 124 and had made 49 from the first two scoring visits in the third before Harold eventually stole it with a 62. The following three frames were all close, Harold levelling proceedings with a 25 clearance in the fourth and Greene regaining a two-frame advantage with a pink- and black-ball wins. The seventh and eighth were fairly one-sided and shared before the match was taken off one frame early, after 3 hours 10 minutes' play. The first four frames of the evening session occupied 90 minutes and dents started to creep in to Greene's fluency as Harold, unspectacularly but solidly, restored parity at 6-6. A long night seemed in prospect and so it turned out. Harold doggedly took a two-frame lead at 8-6 with a couple of 40s, and Greene, having opened the fifteenth with 46 in two visits and seen Harold snapping at his heels with a 45, hung on to close to 8-7. A relatively early night seemed still possible when Harold won the next unremarkably to lead 9-7 but Greene suddenly rediscovered some earlier fluency and made two fine breaks - 75 and 73 - to ensure that Sunday would be Monday before we knew who the winner would be. Early in the decider, Harold gave 24 points away from one snooker, a period followed with openings on both sides yielding not a lot, before Greene handed Harold one chance too many and Harold took the match with a creditable 47 clearance to pink to complete the Crucible field at 12:15 on a Monday morning.

Judd Trump 10-4 David Gilbert
Trump opened the scoring in the first frame with 6, missing an easyish red and later missed on 6, again a fairly easy ball eluding him, letting Gilbert in to take the frame with an 88. This would turn out to be his highest break of the match. Trump held a 3-1 lead at the interval after three scrappy frames during which his 45 was comfortably the best effort. Trump's opening 60 effectively settled the fifth and he would have won the sixth too, from 0-53 down, but he broke down on 45 and a relieved Gilbert potted the pink to stop the rot before also taking the seventh with a colours clearance. Trump's 65 in the ninth was sandwiched between Gilbert's early 43 and 22 clearance - it was Trump who took the re-spotted black at this important juncture to maintain breathing space at 6-3. Trump went 7-3 ahead in a low-scoring tenth before Gilbert's 72 was the only score in taking the eleventh for 7-4. He took a red and black at the beginning of the next but these were the last eight points he scored while Trump, looking relaxed and fluent, made 78, 79 and 100 to progress.

That's all for tonight. The remainder will arrive tomorrow!

[cue1]

Thanks for the report I enjoyed reading it :snooker:

[Rane]

Thank You very much for this report, very interesting reading.

[The Statman]

Dominic Dale 10-6 Michael Holt
Holt's gremlins accompanied him to the second session in which, like Ken Doherty would do a couple of hours later, he failed to win a frame and saw a 6-3 interval lead turn into a 10-6 loss. He stole the second on the black with a 31 clearance to add to his opening frame success in which his 56 had been the principal contibution. From 0-32 in the third he made 51 but looked on as Dale cleared to pink with 37 to register his first success. Dale also levelled at the interval but Holt won three in a row, all in more than one visit, before Dale kept him scoreless in the eighth to narrow the arrears to 5-3 before Holt made a 123 to ensure a three-frame lead at 6-3 going into Sunday. The first two frames next day were both scrappy, Dale's 39 easily the highest of that period, and parity was restored when Dale cleared with 61 to counter an early 37 from Holt. After this, Holt crumbled and failed to make another break above 18. Dale dominated the 13th with 40 and 39 and, after the mid-session interval, made back-to-back centuries, 108 and 101, each after Holt had scuppered an opening almost immediately after it had been presented to him. One felt that, from his 9-6 arrears, there was no way back for Holt and it took only another 10 minutes for this feeling to be proved right when Dale won the sixteenth fairly unspectacularly with Holt accounting for just two solitary reds.

Joe Perry 10-6 Liu Song
I did not see much of this match and it did not create tangible waves of excitement among the crowd who did. With the highest breaks being Song's 58 and 60, the first four frames were shared, Perry's highest to this point being the 30 with which he opened scoring in the second (which he lost). Frame 5 went the way of the Chinese player before Perry won a hat-trick of frames with a 69 and a 53 the main factors. Song looked like winning the ninth when he potted yellow and green to lead 46-23. Perry, though, had other ideas and after two Song fouls, eventually cleared the last four colours to lead 6-3 overnight. Song won the opener on Sunday in one scoring visit of 84, the highest of the match. However the next four saw a clean sweep for Perry, a 38 the highest effort of the first two but and early 62 in the thirteenth and a one-visit win - 74, Perry's highest of the match - in the fourteenth. Song matched this with a 74 of his own but any thoughts of a comeback were extinguished when Perry won the next with a 73 to progress to the Crucible.

Liang Wenbo 7-10 Jamie Burnett
A match of high quality which I wished I'd seen more of. Burnett went 3-0 up with a 124 break in the second, between a scrappy first and third, before Liang claimed a hat-trick with a couple of 40s in the fourth and 60s in the fifth and sixth. He led 3-2 with an 82 in the next, Burnett made his second century, a 118, in the eighth and it was Liang who took the overnight lead when he accounted for the ninth in two visits. On the resumption, Burnett levelled mainly thanks to a 60 before Liang retook the lead with a 101 in the eleventh. Burnett took a scrappy twelfth and made 89 in the thirteenth, from which Liang bizarrely played on - maybe to get his hand in although the interval was immediately following. Burnett's third century of the match, a 132, gave him an 8-6 lead and, although Liang took the fifteenth from an early 53, Burnett always looked the stronger and he bore out this impression two frames later with an 87. Liang did not carry on after this one.

Mark Davis 5-10 Rory McLeod
This match did not catch my eye beforehand as one to watch but it was probably better than my foresight had envisaged. Davis struggled on the outset, and had a best effort of 29 as he found himself 3-0 down - soon to be 4-0 as McLeod made a decisive 85 heading into the interval. On their return, Davis was well placed in frame five, making a 49 to give himself a small lead, but again McLeod got the better of it and went 5-0 up on the last few colours. Two further scrappy frames went in favour of McLeod before Davis finally broke his duck in the eighth with an overdue 64 to the brown. He followed this up with a couple of 40s in the ninth to give himself a glimmer of hope ending the session 7-2 behind. This became 9-2, though, in the evening as McLeod took the scrappy opener followed by a 130 total clearance - but with the finishing line in sight he took a while to cross it. Davis opened the twelfth with 52 but had to pot the last two colours to win it; he found some flency in the next with a 95 and, when he sealed the fourteenth on the yellow after an earlier 64, one could sense a few butterflies. They were swatted away, with some relief I suspect, when McLeod scraped the 40-mnute fifteenth frame by clearing the last three colours after successfully laying the snooker he had needed on the blue.

[The Statman]

Mark King 10-5 Mike Dunn
The opening three frames were dominated by 60ish breaks - King's 61 opened the match and he led 2-0 thanks to a 65 before Dunn opened his account in the third with 68. The numbers were smaller in the next three but King won them all before Dunn won the next two with a chief run of 52, before King's 74 rounded off the session and gave him a 6-3 lead. On the resumption King extended his lead to 7-3 before the highest break of the match, 84, from Dunn countered King's early 43 to reduce the deficit to three frames. Dunn also claimed the twelfth with a 45 to blue and opened the next with 33 but he was pegged back and after King snaffled it on the black he quickly added the fourteenth with his best effort of the match, 79, and ensured progression in two visits in the next.

Martin Gould 10-6 Robert Milkins
Neither player got out of the blocks with any conviction and the first break above 30 did not arrive until the third frame which Gould won in two scoring visits, after the scrappy first two had also gone his way. A 65 followed for 4-0 before Milkins made 36 to get himself well-placed in the fifth. But Gould's 52 and colours clearance made it 5-0. Gould also looked good in the sixth when he opened with a 50 but, given the foregoing, Milkings acted creditably in making 75 to put his first frame on the board. The next was almost a repeat, Gould opening with 52 but watching as Milkins cleard with 65. The momentum had begun to swing and, after Milkins had won the eighth in two visits and the ninth when Gould's mid-frame 45 had threatened to overturn a 40-point deficit, Gould must have been glad that the session was over. A scrappy opener on the resumption fell to Gould, as did the next when Milkins had broken down on 53 and Gould overcame the deficit in two scoring visits. Milkins did take the scrappy twelfth but struggled badly - as did Gould, it must be said - and lost the next two, awfully scrappy, frames. Gould finally found some fluency with a 52 to lead 9-6 and finished the match, after an early 60, with a bizarre and clever shot selection. Milkins played a red which missed and landed by one corner pocket, but the cue-ball came to rest the other side of the spotted black to leave it fortunately safe. However, a red trickled along and came to rest touching the white, and when the referee called "Touching Ball", because he was deemed already to hit the red, he played directly to the black and made the plant on the other red.

[miscuehamburg]

Great review. Thank you

[The Statman]

Marcus Campbell 10-6 Matthew Selt
After Campbell had taken a scrappy opening frame, Selt gradually found his rhythm and took the next three frames with breaks of 47, 69 and 123. However, these would be his only successful frames of the day. When Campbell won the disjointed fifth his highest break was only 28 but he nevertheless achieved parity in frame six with a 57 and won the seventh with 73. Things once again became bogged down and when Selt broke down on 42 after the last red in frame eight, Campbell cleared to pink and won an unexciting ninth frame to take an overnight 6-3 lead. The next day Selt took the last red to trail by 25 but could not get any further as Campbell extended his winning streak to six by clearing to the blue. An early 37 laid the foundations for Selt to pull one back, to trail 7-4, in the next but two half-centuries from Campbell in the twelfth took him back to four in front. This alternating pattern was repeated, this time thanks to a second century, 101, from Selt and a pink ball win for Campbell in the marathon, 51-minute fourteenth. At 9-5, Selt did overcome Campbell’s opening 46 with a 60 clearance but this was only to delay the inevitable as Campbell won the sixteenth in untroubled but unremarkable fashion.

Ryan Day 10-7 Liu Chuang
Day looked comfortably in control for much of the match but a wobble midway through the second session did raise some doubts which he managed to dispel. He won the first frame mainly thanks to a 63 and cleared with 33 to counter Chuang’s 52 and win the second on the black. Chuang’s early 60 could have been snuffed out but Day broke down on 40 and Chuang eventually took it, adding the fourth for mid-session parity with an 83. Day came back strongly from the interval with consecutive centuries, 127 and 122, and backed this up with a 55 in the seventh to lead 5-2 before Chuang made the only score in the eighth, an 86, his highest of the contest. Day’s early 64 was the backbone of his winning the ninth for a 6-3 overnight lead and an early 54 next day made it 7-3. Chuang’s initial 54 in the eleventh proved decisive before Day made it 8-4 in the fragmentary twelfth. At this point Chuang found some form and Day stuttered somewhat. Chuang opened the next with a not-quite-enough 61 plus another 8, but Day could only reply with 25; Day made only 6 in frame fourteen before leaving Chuang to claim it with 54 and 32; and from 40 behind in the fifteenth Day made only 5 and Chuang gratefully sealed it with 65. Now only 8-7 ahead, Day was starting to look a little edgy, but found his composure in the disjointed sixteenth, by far the longest of the match at 30 minutes. In all there were ten scoring visits, each player missing more than his fair share of chances. When Day made 17 to the frame-ball green, Chuang did carry on but he could not gain the snooker he needed and he was also unable to counter an early 65 in what turned out to be the last frame.

Matthew Stevens 10-9 Fergal O’Brien
The match of the round by quite a margin lasted for 6½ hours but the pair could not be separated until the very last ball.
Stevens took the opener with a 78 and the second without a break of twenty, before conceding the third when he left himself needing snookers, missing the colour off the thirteenth red. O’Brien then made a decisive 53 to take them level into the interval. Stevens went 4-2 ahead thanks to a couple of 30s and 40s and this became 4-3 thanks to a couple more 30s from O’Brien. In frame eight, after benefiting from a couple of O’Brien fouls, Stevens found himself awkwardly snookered in the pack from potting the first red, from which he gave 42 points away in trying to hit the black. With fourteen reds on the table, the score stood at 42-16. Nevertheless Stevens made 51 and a clinching 31 to win the frame 99-42 with still a red on the table. O’Brien won the final frame of the session in two visits to trail 5-4 overnight. Next day, Stevens needed two chances in the tenth and opened with 32 in the eleventh but O’Brien’s 100 clearance made it 6-5. Stevens won the next in three visits before O’Brien again halved the deficit, with 32 and 70. Stevens regained his two-frame lead at 8-6 with a highest effort of 42 before O’Brien levelled the match at 8-8, thanks to an 81 in the fifteenth and a black-ball steal in the sixteenth after Stevens had opened the scoring with 65. Stevens was again in first in the next, with 38, but had to sit out an 82 from O’Brien who thus led for the first time, 9-8. Twelve minutes later we were entering the decider after Stevens made light work of the eighteenth with a 129 clearance.
It was O’Brien who opened the scoring in the 42-minute decider, with 42. After Stevens had potted a red, he left a tricky black over the corner pocket but this meant O’Brien had no pot to attempt. As the reds started to be nudged towards the black, a lengthy safety battle ensued. This eventually came to an end when O’Brien fluffed his thin safety shot, catching a second red full and leaving the cue-ball among the reds. Stevens shot out of his chair but could only sit down again as he watched a red trickle into the middle pocket at a narrow angle. O’Brien could only make 17 from this large slice of fortune, though, and he went back to his chair 58 in front with 59 remaining. O’Brien was left another chance but missed a longish red and soon Stevens was at the table. The early stages of the clearance were fairly straightforward but his main obstacle would always be the pink, which was on the yellow-side cushion between the baulk line and the middle pocket. He cleverly dislodged it from the cushion in taking the brown, but this compromised position on the blue and, potting it to the baulk corner he finished, with the cue-ball on the brown spot, with an almost dead-straight pink to the middle with little scope for position on the black. He did force the slightest angle, but the cue-ball came to rest on the centre line of the table, a foot or so from the black. With only a safety shot available, he made it a good one, with the black tight on the top cushion and the cue-ball seven or eight feet away. After a minute and a half of thought, O’Brien elected to play the black down the spots to baulk but he got a marginal double-kiss and left Stevens a three-quarter-length straight pot to the green pocket, black about four feet from pocket. There was no let-off for O’Brien, who could only look straight down the shot from his chair and, black safely in, Stevens gave a shout of delight accompanied by an animated punch of the fist, in case anyone was in any doubt as to what it means to qualify for the Crucible.

[Rane]

I saw Matts comment on twitter about Martin Gould using the black ball to pot a red and couldn´t find out what on earth was going on, but that was some clever thinking.

[ferret]

Good report as usual Chris, I have put the copy you sent me up on the blog now and added some pretty pictures to it.

http://www.thesnookerblog.com/2011/0...ifying-report/

Postcards form Sheffield soon always enjoy reading those.

[Matt_2745]

I saw Matts comment on twitter about Martin Gould using the black ball to pot a red and couldn´t find out what on earth was going on, but that was some clever thinking.

Chris called it too, impressive!

[jonplayer]

Brilliant work Statman. Good reading about my old mate Jimmy Robertson, I used to kick his proverbial all over the place. Thats a lie - he was always a bit special, really good to see him starting to acheive his potential though.
J