Which matches are you looking forward to ?

[Rane]

seriously

i thought robbo would win pretty easily

My opinion as well. Robertson is my favorit player, but I don´t think he´ll be in much trouble, and I like the close matches more than the run away victories, so yes hopefully I´m able to watch it, but it´s not one of the matches I expect a lot of (except a comfortable victory).

[ore]

seriously

i thought robbo would win pretty easily

And that is why you make it your favorite match - easy win?

I'm more in the opinion (or hope.. ) as Looki about this match, O'Brien could bite with his teeth not to let Robbo through.

[Alex0paul]

Cannot wait for the Dott v Ebdon match. It isn't quite a top 16 shootout as Dott needs to reach the semis if Cope or Wenbo lose in round 1.

[david16]

All of them really.
First round though I want to see the Hendry match most because I have never seen the other guy play and I am curious to see if he can make a match of it.:snooker:

You would probably not be wondering whether he could make a game off it if he faced Higgins who has much more recent world championships winning form than Hendry, yet you are wondering if he will do better than string more than 3 or 4 sucessful short ranged pots together before coughing up a horrible miss, get badly out of position or produce an ugly foul to hand Hendry an easy clearance.

Zhang making a match of it is much more likely than Hendry dropping just 1 or 2 frames or even doing a complete whitewash.

People think because they haven't seen a player before that they can't be any good at all. Yang was unheard of before the USPGA golf championships but look what happened there. I am not saying Zhang will win the match but he will be much more of a threat than people automatically assume.

Zhang would be much more hurt taking just 2 frames off Hendry than Hendry dropping 6. Hendry if he wins the match would not be embarassed at all if Zhang collected 5 to 9 frames off him, but Zhang would be devasted to score 1 frame and barely scrape 100 points together in 11 frames of snooker.

It's been 16 years since Hendry last destroyed somebody 10-1 at the crucible, and I can't see him ever doing it again against higher class 1st round opponents than he did when he was generally thrashing 1st round oppoents 10-1 to 10-3 that he did in 1992 to 1995. I can't remember the last time a 10-1 happened at the Crucible it was a hell of a long time ago, can't see a well out of prime Hendry suddenly now being the man to do the 10-1.

People saying Hendry will come in expecting to do the likes of Zhang 10-1 or 10-2 and then achieve it for him to feel in any good form at all is ridiculous. It's not 1994 now, it's 2010. If Hendry waltzes in thinking it's going to be a 10-1 walkover in 1st gear like v Surinder Gill and Danny Fowler he did, he could be in serious trouble.

[Mal]

It's been 16 years since Hendry last destroyed somebody 10-1 at the crucibe, and I highly doubt he will ever do it again against higher class 1st round opponents than he did when he was generally thrashing 1st round oppoents 10-1 to 10-3 that he did in 1992 to 1994. I can't remember the last time a 10-1 happened at the Crucible it was a hell of a long time ago, can't see a well out of prime Hendry suddenly now being the man to do the 10-1.

People saying Hendry will come in expecting to do the likes of Zhang 10-1 or 10-2 and then achieve it for him to feel in any good form at all is ridiculous. It's not 1994 now, it's 2010. If Hendry waltzes in thinking it's going to be a 10-1 walkover in 1st gear like v Surinder Gill and Danny Fowler he did, he could be in serious trouble.

10-3s happen each year. And, well, the 10-1s and 10-2s still happen - there's been three 10-2s in the last three years and you only have to go back to 2006 for the last 10-1 when Barry Hawkins lost 10-1 to Doherty and Hamilton lost 10-1 to Williams. So TWO in 2006 - Hardly a hell of a long time ago. The year before Milkins lost 10-1 and Wattana and Drago have also lost 10-1 in 2002 and 2001. In fact there have been 16 (SIXTEEN!) occasions between 2000 and 2009 where a player has lost 10-1 or 10-2

However between 1990 and 1999 it only happened 13 times, so actually less when people like to say qualifiers were weaker - Sorry to disprove your theory. I'm certainly not saying Hendry will win 10-2 or better - I don't think he will, probably about 10-4 - Fact is Hendry is not as good now, nothing to do with the class of the qualifiers. - Hendry was a different class to everyone, just now he is not. There was also just as many shocks back in the 80s and 90s with qualifiers getting through to 2nd round, QFs etc. And statistics also prove this. I do think there will be shocks, but also think there will be about 3 or 4 matches that finish 10-3 or more convincing.

People talk about Davis always winning first round matches in the 80s, but just off the top of my head I remember him losing to Tony Chappel, Mike Hallet (in early 80s about 5 years before Hallet appeared in top 16), Ray Reardon (5-0 loss in 1988 when Reardon was 51st in world), Tony Knowles all in the first round that he played in events.

[Odrl]

I can't remember the last time a 10-1 happened at the Crucible it was a hell of a long time ago

Not that long ago actually, it was 2006. And it happened twice, Williams against Hamilton and Doherty against Hawkins.

In 2007 and 2009 the record was 10-2, in 2008 it was 10-3. And if you go further back, there is generally always a 10-2 or a 10-1 result somewhere.

[montoya10]

I can't remember the last time a 10-1 happened at the Crucible it was a hell of a long time ago

I thought it was 2005 Mark Williams 10-1 Robert Milkins. But I was wrong

2006 Ken Doherty 10-1 Barry Hawkins
2006 Mark Williams 10-1 Anthony Hamilton

People saying Hendry will come in expecting to do the likes of Zhang 10-1 or 10-2 and then achieve it for him to feel in any good form at all is ridiculous. It's not 1994 now, it's 2010. If Hendry waltzes in thinking it's going to be a 10-1 walkover in 1st gear like v Surinder Gill and Danny Fowler he did, he could be in serious trouble.

I agree. Being in such a mood will mean shooting himself from the foot for Hendry. Zhang is a mystery and could be the surprise player of the tournament if Hendry starts to feel too much comfortable

Edit: Wow, the forum reacts quite speedily

[Mal]

Cannot wait for the Dott v Ebdon match. It isn't quite a top 16 shootout as Dott needs to reach the semis if Cope or Wenbo lose in round 1.

I'm looking forward to this as well - In fact I think there is more pressure on Ebdon because as you say, Dott still has a lot to do before he thinks about getting back in top 16 - I'd have liked Ebdon to have drawn Cope or Wenbo, where it really would have been a shootout for top 16.

I think Ebdon will handle the pressure though and pull through.
I'll watch them all, but other matches I'm looking forward to are Selby - Doherty as Doherty beat him earlier in the year and let's not forget that in 2006, Doherty was provisionally world no.1.

Allen Ford should be fast flowing. Cope - Carter should also be close and could be of a high standard, but as another poster said, if it goes close, there could be a few misses! I think O'Brien will pose Robertson some problems and Lee could make life difficult for Maguire. I wouldn't be surprised to see Day lose either as Mark Davis has had a good couple of years and is of course the most recent world champion in snooker (the six red version!!)

I think Williams, O'Sullivan,, Ding, Fu, Hendry, Murphy, Higgins and King will all get through without any difficulty and Perry - Holt - I would back Perry and if he gets a good start that will be convincing - if not, I'd still take Perry to scrape through.

[Mal]

10-3s happen each year. And, well, the 10-1s and 10-2s still happen - there's been three 10-2s in the last three years and you only have to go back to 2006 for the last 10-1 when Barry Hawkins lost 10-1 to Doherty and Hamilton lost 10-1 to Williams. So TWO in 2006 - Hardly a hell of a long time ago. The year before Milkins lost 10-1 and Wattana and Drago have also lost 10-1 in 2002 and 2001. In fact there have been 16 (SIXTEEN!) occasions between 2000 and 2009 where a player has lost 10-1 or 10-2

However between 1990 and 1999 it only happened 13 times, so actually less when people like to say qualifiers were weaker

Also in the 1980s, it happened 13 times (10-2 or more convincing) . And of these, on three occasions, it was the top 16 player getting hammered (Davis, Alex Higgins and Cliff Wilson, so does that mean that today's game has a bigger disparity between top players and bottom players than 80s and 90s - I don't personally agree with this, but statistics show that at the world championship in more recent years, the class does tell.