UK Championship 25/11 - 7/12

[ace man]

Looking forward to this event. Wish the main sponsor was something other than a dreadful betting company, for e.g. something like an automotive company, IT giant, a bank...etc. Snooker would do very well to attract any of those. May even happen in future, who knows.

[Rocket147]

Was just thinking back to the weekend and how many attempts Murphy had to get a 147. He's the first player to claim three 147's in one year. His odds will surely have gone down after winning the Ruhr open trophy.

[inacion]

Looking forward to this event. Wish the main sponsor was something other than a dreadful betting company, for e.g. something like an automotive company, IT giant, a bank...etc. Snooker would do very well to attract any of those. May even happen in future, who knows.

Currently most of top players are from UK, but snooker is developing on other countries. When other countries have top players will be easier to attract bigger sponsors. As long snooker prove to be success on other countries events also helps.

[robertmac]

World Snooker shows no matches on friday
Nov 28th. Is this a day off and are there any
other days off?

[Odrl]

World Snooker shows no matches on friday
Nov 28th. Is this a day off and are there any
other days off?

I think that's to give the BBC a chance to set up the cameras and stuff like that in the main arena. :smile:

[robertmac]

Thanks. Are you going to give us your excellent
pre-game anaysis odrl? I hope so.

[Odrl]

Thanks. Are you going to give us your excellent
pre-game anaysis odrl? I hope so.

I can't promise excellence, but I am just typing something up now. :smile: It's the full 128 players here, so it's going pretty slow. I've only got to the first part of quarter 3. :smile:

[robertmac]

Wow that must be quite a lengthy job but it will
be appreciated by many myself included. Thanks.

[Odrl]

Okay, a couple of words ahead of the UK Championship then... :smile:

First of all, let me join those who think the reduction in the length of matches is a real shame, and the systematic dumbing down of this tournament is one of the rare major failures of the Hearn administration. This year's unpleasant surprise was the introduction of best-of-11 semi-finals, as if last year's semi between Robertson and Bingham wasn't a great example of why the longer matches are so superior. We also just had that great semi-final between Williams and Allen in the International Championship a couple of weeks ago, but unfortunately those kinds of matches can now only be enjoyed in the World Championship and the major finals, which is not nearly enough for my taste.

The last time the UK was held with two-session matches was in 2010, and that was a really cracking tournament, starting with great matches right from the 1st round with Hendry-White, followed by Allen-Ding, Maguire-Selby, Higgins-Dott, Murphy-Robertson, Higgins-Maguire and others later on in the tournament, all going down to the final or the penultimate frame. And the tournament ended on a really high note, first with the Murphy-Williams semi-final, followed by one of the most exciting finals in the time I've been following snooker.

It's a real shame all that has been taken away now, especially as most snooker fans were (and still are) clearly against those changes. The highlights of this tournament have thus come mostly in semi-finals and finals in the last three years (surprise, surprise), while the earlier rounds haven't provided us with many classics.

Having said all that, I am still really looking forward to this tournament. The first part of the season was quite enjoyable, from the Wuxi Classic in the summer right down to the International Championship a couple of weeks ago, but this middle part of the season could be even better. Last year I expected new contenders to emerge from the UK onwards, but it didn't really happen, as Ding and Robertson still remained as two of the major players, so it will be interesting to see how it goes this time. :smile:

The format is similar to last year, all 128 players starting out in the 1st round, a lot of the early matches played in a more of a "qualifying atmosphere", but last year we had very few surprises in the early rounds, and Marco Fu was the only really big name who failed to make it through.

As requested, here are some of my thoughts on the draw this year...

Quarter 1:

Neil Robertson v. Joe O'Connor
Kyren Wilson v. Gary Wilson
Kurt Maflin v. Chris Norbury
Peter Ebdon v. Ross Muir
Robert Milkins v. Michael Leslie
Marcus Campbell v. Scott Donaldson
Graeme Dott v. Alexander Ursenbacher
Anthony Hamilton v. Craig Steadman

This tournament is strictly seeded, so it's no surprise Neil Robertson finds himself in a fairly easy section as 1st seed and defending champion. He has reached the business end of this tournament four years in a row now, and this generally seems to be a part of the season he does well in. He started with a ranking title in Wuxi and another final in Australia, but since then he has had a couple of pretty average months. He lost early in both Chinese tournaments that followed, even though he was in front and on the verge of victory in both matches. He had a decent run yesterday before losing to Maguire, and he lost a close semi-final to Trump in the Champion of Champions, so the form is not too far off. There are a couple of players who could be dangerous for him here, starting with Peter Ebdon. They have played five times in the major events over the last four years, all in China, and Ebdon has won them all, so he is probably one of the few bogey players Robertson has. He played quite well in the International Championship, but ran into an in-form Jamie Burnett in the last16. Most of his best results have come in China in recent years, with a final in Australia as well, while the UK events have been a struggle for him. He won this event in 2006, with some brilliant snooker, but he hasn't reached the business end since. Kyren and Gary Wilson play each other in the 1st round here, both struggling pretty badly in the qualifiers this year. They both looked much more dangerous last season, Kyren reaching the quarter-finals of the Shanghai Masters and Gary playing his best snooker in this tournament, but at this point in time it's hard to see either of them surprising Robertson here. The same goes for Kurt Maflin I suppose, no results to suggest he is playing well enough.

Further on in this section we have Robert Milkins, yesterday's finalist. It certainly wouldn't be a huge surprise if he went through here, considering how well he has played at times this season. He reached his fifth major ranking semi-final in the International Championship a month ago, arguably the best result of his career, and this time he had to do it the hard way, beating the likes of Murphy and Fu among others. He was eventually outclassed 9-2 by Ricky Walden, and this seems to be the general pattern with him these days, he wins most of his matches, but whenever he comes across a top player playing really well he usually struggles to live with them. He is seeded to meet Graeme Dott in the last32, where he would be the higher seed, one place above Dott in the rankings at this point in time. He would probably be favourite as well, as Dott hasn't done much this season so far. Also, the last seven major ranking quarter-finals Dott has reached have all come in China, although I suppose it's a similar story with Milkins as well. The other players in this section don't impress me much. Marcus Campbell seemed to be playing some of the best snooker of his career a couple of seasons ago, but more recently he has been pretty awful, while Anthony Hamilton has struggled since last year's Wuxi Classic as well. Scott Donaldson played well at the start of the season, but he too has done very little in the recent tournaments. Perhaps Craig Steadman is a better bet to cause a surprise or two here. He beat Dott 6-1 in the International Championship recently, and had a good win over Hawkins in the Ruhr Open.

It's going to be hard for Milkins or Dott to get past Robertson, but you never know. Milkins of course beat him in the World Championship last year, in a much longer match, but Robertson has won the couple of their matches since, including the quarter-final of the Australian Open this season. As for Dott, he has played Robertson quite a few times since their World final in 2010, but it's Robertson who has mostly dominated their matches. They played in this tournament in 2011, Robertson winning 6-3, and five frames came down to the final black! Robertson is generally strong in matches where there is a bit of rivalry involved, or whenever he has a point to prove, so I think Milkins and Dott would have a better chance if they met Ebdon in the last16. Milkins and Ebdon have already played three times in the UK Championship in the past and, not surprisingly, Ebdon won the older matches, while Milkins prevailed in the more recent one. The Dott-Ebdon rivalry is also quite interesting. The 2006 World final was actually the first time Dott ever beat Ebdon, but he has had much the better record since then, beating him another couple of times in the longer matches of the WC, as well as on other occasions. All things considered, my bet here is still Robertson. :wink:

Tom Ford v. Barry Pinches
Alan McManus v. Joel Walker
Alfie Burden v. Chris Wakelin
Stuart Bingham v. Thanawat Tirapongpaiboon
Ken Doherty v. Mitchell Mann
Michael White v. Cao Xinlong
Robbie Williams v. Sam Baird
Ricky Walden v. Steve Davis

If Robertson's easier draw makes sense, it also makes sense that the 8th and 9th seed in this section are much tougher to split. Stuart Bingham only had a couple of good tournaments last season, the UK being one of them, but he has started this season much better, with at least a decent run in all major events. The highlight so far has been his triumph in the Shanghai Masters, the second major ranking title of his career. The players closest to him in the draw shouldn't trouble him too much, but Alan McManus could be a decent obstacle. He has also had a good season so far, with quite a few wins over the top players, and it's usually taken good performances from players to knock him out of major tournaments. He played Bingham in the quarter-finals in Shanghai, but Bingham proved too strong on that occasion and won comfortably. It's interesting that McManus hasn't reached the business end of the UK Championship for more than 15 years, so it will be interesting to see whether he can put that right, like he did in the WC earlier in the year. He didn't play in the Ruhr Open though, and he spent a week doing commentary during the Champion of Champions, so he might be a little rusty here. It's a tricky opening match for him against Joel Walker, a quarter-finalist in the Welsh Open last season. They played last year as well, McManus winning 6-5 on the final black. This time he is probably a bigger favourite, as Walker has struggled a little since that good run. Another player who is struggling is Tom Ford, a dangerous opponent for the top players in the past, but this season he has lost in the qualifiers or the early rounds of all major tournaments so far. Thanawat Tirapongpaiboon is another interesting player, making his season debut here, having missed all the previous major events, but I can't realistically see him getting through this section. Chris Wakelin is also a longshot, but he did reach the quarter-finals of the Ruhr Open, so the form is clearly there, and he should have a good chance of at least winning his opening match, even though he is the lower seed.

Ricky Walden is the winner of the last major ranking event, the International Championship, his third ranking title and probably the biggest one of his career so far. He didn't exactly have the toughest draw, apart from the final, but he played very well and fully deserved the title. He too decided to skip the Ruhr Open, so it will be interesting to see what his form is like here. His toughest early opponent should definitely be Michael White, who reached the quarter-finals of the last two ranking events, and was only beaten by a very strong Mark Allen both times. White has proved to be a bit of a slow starter in matches, but he tends to find his game and play better towards the end, and the best-of-11 format usually suits such players. He won't have happy memories of the last time he played Walden though, as he lost heavily in the quarter-finals of the 2013 WC, 13-6. I think he has matured a little as a player this season though, so he should put up a better fight. The experienced Ken Doherty also finds himself in this section, but there is nothing particularly encouraging to point out from his recent results. And speaking of experience, Steve Davis is back as well. He is not here on merit, which is something that usually annoys me greatly, but in some ways it is quite fitting to have Davis here, as he has won this tournament more times than anyone else, even going back to the times before it became a ranking event. He also reached the final here in 2005, his last crack at a really big title, where he lost to a young Ding Junhui. He played superbly in that tournament though, particularly against defending champion Maguire in the last16. Doherty was also among his victims, and they could meet again here, but they would both need to win two matches, which seems unlikely. Also worth mentioning here are Mitchell Mann, who played alright in the International Championship before losing to white in the last32, and Sam Baird, who went one better and reached the last16 of that tournament.

The 8th seed against the 9th seed sounds a little unimpressive, but Bingham and Walden are the winners of the previous two ranking events, and both very much in form this season. It would be a repeat of the 2012 Wuxi Classic final, which was a pretty unusual match. Walden won comfortably, 10-4, but Bingham seemed to be making all the breaks, with three centuries, including a 147. I kind of get the feeling their best form is behind them for a while now, and I would expect other contenders to emerge in this middle part of the season. They should probably still get through the early rounds here at least though. Another interesting combination would be Walden against McManus, because these two have never met in a major match, if I'm not mistaken. There is also a chance of a couple of rematches from the WC earlier this year. Doherty had that surprising win over Bingham, but lost in the next round to McManus, who generally has a very good record over him. I will go for Walden in this section. :wink:

Quarter 2:

Barry Hawkins v. Ashley Carty
Nigel Bond v. Stuart Carrington
Fergal O'Brien v. Igor Figueiredo
Anthony McGill v. Michael Georgiou
John Higgins v. Lee Walker
Jamie Cope v. John Astley
Matthew Stevens v. Allan Taylor
Gerard Greene v. Vinnie Calabrese

In all honesty, this section is a little weak, as most of the high-ranked players are struggling pretty badly at the moment. Perhaps Barry Hawkins is the most reliable, although he too hasn't had a good run in any tournament recently. He reached the semi-finals of the Wuxi Classic at the start of the season, but since then he's had a couple of early exits in the major events. To be fair to him though, he lost twice to Mark Williams and once to Ebdon, and you don't want to be meeting those players in the early rounds, so Hawkins has been a little unlucky in that respect. He also lost in the 1st round of the Ruhr Open, this time against a bigger outsider. He has quite an easy draw here, a possible 2nd round match against Nigel Bond, who has shown very little form himself recently. It wouldn't be a surprise if Hawkins played Stuart Carrington instead, as Carrington played quite well in the Ruhr Open, getting a couple of good wins before losing in the last16. Fergal O'Brien also reached the last16 in Mülheim, and he has not done too badly in the major events recently either, reaching the quarter-finals of a ranking event for the first time in seven years in Shanghai. He starts against Igor Figueiredo, a player whose form is a bit of a mystery, but it's nice to see him back in a major event in any case. Anthony McGill is the other remaining seeded player here, also without any great recent form, but he should be among the first in line to take advantage if Hawkins is out of sorts.

Elsewhere in this section, John Higgins has a pretty reasonable path to the last16, if he could only find a bit of form. Last season he only had two good runs in major tournaments, this season he is still waiting for his first. He lost in the 1st round of the last two ranking events, followed by an early exit from the Champion of Champions, and he lost to Fu in the Ruhr Open, 4-0, without scoring a point. Maybe you could say he mostly faced tricky opponents, but against Lee Walker here he has no excuse. Higgins seems like the kind of player whom the best-of-11 format should suit, but for some reason it doesn't. He has failed to reach the business end of this tournament since the new format was introduced, same story with the International Championship, and the Masters has always been a bad tournament for him, even when he was playing strongly in general. He played Jamie Cope in this tournament in 2007 and lost heavily, 9-3, but those were better times for Cope as well. They also had that great match in the 2nd round of the World Championship in 2009, 13-12 to Higgins, but I can't see their potential match here being as high-quality as that, because Cope has done nothing to suggest he is playing well either. Matthew Stevens has also struggled for most of the season, losing in the qualifiers of two out of four previous major ranking events, but he took advantage of a slightly weaker field in Australia and reached the quarter-finals there. He had a couple of matches against Higgins at the start of last season, Higgins was too strong for him in the semi-finals of the Wuxi Classic, but a few tournaments later Higgins was already struggling and lost to him with a pretty pathetic performance in the International Championship. Gerard Greene is also capable of doing something here, but he too follows the theme of this section, having failed to make it out of the qualifiers in any major tournament so far this season.

If Higgins and Hawkins do make it through, you would have to make Hawkins favourite at this point in time. There isn't any great history between them, but Hawkins did win their recent match in the Champion of Champions, 4-1 in the 1st round. He also had a couple of good matches against Cope back in 2007. They first played in the semi-finals of the 2007 China Open, Cope prevailed 6-5 by winning the last two frames on the final black, and one of those frames was a really intriguing one where Hawkins was going for snookers on the colours, but I forget which one it was now. :smile: They also played in the UK Championship later that year, Cope once again winning in a decider, 9-8. That would suggest Cope has a slight psychological edge over Hawkins, but of course that counts for nothing if their form on the table is so many levels apart. Stevens also has the class to beat Hawkins here, especially if he can find the kind of form he had in the 2012 WC, when he beat Hawkins 13-11 in the 2nd round, coming from 0-3 and 3-6 down early in the match. As I said though, in a section of struggling players, I find Hawkins to be the most reliable. :wink:

Matthew Selt v. Hammad Miah
Xiao Guodong v. Ian Glover
Rory McLeod v. Ian Burns
Allister Carter v. Zhang Anda
Ben Woollaston v. Michael Wasley
Dominic Dale v. Tony Drago
Peter Lines v. Joe Swail
Ronnie O'Sullivan v. Daniel Wells

Ali Carter is back on the big stage, appearing in a major ranking event for the first time this season. He played in the Champion of Champions earlier in the month, but Robertson didn't really give him much chance, so we couldn't really see how well he is playing. He has been close to a really big result in the UK Championship on a couple of occasions in the past, most recently in 2012 when he lost the semi-final to Shaun Murphy from 8-4 up. There was a nice feature about him on Eurosport yesterday, where he talked about how the pressure was now off him, and he would be happy even if nothing else came his way in snooker. It's an interesting attitude to have, but it could work both ways. It could put him into a really positive and relaxed mindset, or it could make him a little less driven and ambitious on the table, now that he has got a victory in life that snooker titles just can't compare with. I would like to think it will be the former... He opens with a match against Zhang Anda, who has himself played very little in recent months, not sure for what reason. Rory McLeod is one of the seeds who could maybe be in trouble in the 1st round here. He has had a quiet season so far, while his opponent, Ian Burns, has just had the best result of his career, by reaching the last16 of the International Championship. Xiao Guodong also finds himself in this section, and he could be a good little bet. He played very well here last season, but came up against a very strong Trump, and lost 6-2 in a match where they had five centuries between them. I don't think Trump is his favourite opponent, as he also beat him in the UK in 2010, 9-7, as well as the semi-finals of the Australian Open this season, once again in a very high-quality match. Still, the fact that Xiao got to that stage shows how strong he has become as a player, and he didn't play too badly in the last event either, a last16 exit against Milkins in the International Championship a month ago. Xiao's first stronger opponent here could be Matthew Selt, who had a couple of wins last weekend and got to the last32, before losing to Trump. I think Carter against Xiao is quite a realistic prospect here, perhaps a little too early for my liking, as both players have the class to go further in the tournament, but then again it's silly to complain about the early rounds being too strong. :smile: They had an excellent match in the World Championship this year, Carter winning 10-8, and it could be a good one here again.

Ronnie O'Sullivan is by far the strongest name in this quarter, and certainly a big favourite to get through his little section of the draw. This tournament has not been his best in the last decade or so, and he has probably had more "nonsense" here than in any other place outside of China. By nonsense I mean his meltdown against Stephen Hendry when he conceded at 4-1 in 2006, or his towel incident against Mark King in 2005, or conceding frames with 10 reds left against Joe Perry in 2008... But I think we can agree that O'Sullivan seems much more stable and disciplined at this point in time, so someone will probably have to take him out with a good performance. It won't be easy though. The International Championship was a tournament of many surprises, a lot of the top players going out in the early rounds, but O'Sullivan was among those who survived the longest, before eventually playing a really bad match against Williams in the quarter-finals. I expected him to find some of his best form in this middle part of the season, so it was not surprising to see him playing so well in the Champion of Champions, much better than last year in fact, although the title came just the same. His run to the last16 looks almost inevitable here, but of course nothing is guaranteed. Peter Lines isn't playing well at the moment, but it's worth mentioning that he has never lost to O'Sullivan, and has beaten him both times they've met in the PTCs. Lines is by no means certain to even win his first match though, in fact he is probably second favourite against the in-form Joe Swail. Two runs to the last16 of events for Swail recently, in the International Championship as well as the Ruhr Open, so he should be pretty high on confidence, especially following his great win over Robertson in Chengdu. Ben Woollaston could have done something similar in Chengdu as well, he led O'Sullivan at the interval and had great chances to beat him, but he just came up short in the end. He did beat O'Sullivan in a PTC last season though. There could also be a rematch between Dominic Dale and Michael Wasley, who met in the 2nd round of the WC this year, Wasley only just avoiding a defeat with a session to spare. Dale also beat him in the Shanghai qualifiers this season. I think Wasley's case is a good example of how this flat draw system can be a little unfair, because he is yet to get through the qualifiers in a major event this season, while he has had to play some of the best players in the world in his opening matches. Dale is also still waiting for a good run this season, and I think I'm right in saying that he has never beaten O'Sullivan in a match of any importance, so it's tough to see him going through here.

Looking at the possible last16 match in this section, Carter against O'Sullivan seems the most likely, and I don't think there is any great need to go through all the big matches these two have played in the past. O'Sullivan's dominance over Carter is well known, and he is always a big favourite in this pairing. Having said that, you never know when runs like that might end. I certainly didn't expect O'Sullivan to lose to Williams in the International Championship, so maybe Carter can get some heart from that result and finally win one himself. It really is a favourable quarter for O'Sullivan, not just because of Carter, he also has very strong records against Hawkins, Cope and Stevens, so the only player who doesn't struggle against him here is Higgins, and there is a very good chance they won't have to meet. O'Sullivan against Xiao might be interesting as well. They haven't played much, but O'Sullivan did beat Xiao in the Welsh Open last season with a very good performance. O'Sullivan to go through. :wink:

Quarter 3:

Ding Junhui v. John Sutton
Jimmy White v. Dave Harold
Mark King v. James Cahill
Andrew Higginson v. Tian Pengfei
Joe Perry v. Liu Chuang
Mike Dunn v. Andrew Pagett
Mark Davis v. Jak Jones
Jamie Jones v. Liam Highfield

Another relatively weak section. Ding Junhui is the big name, but this season he has not been among the best players in the world. At the end of last season he held five major ranking titles (4+1, if you will allow me another dig at the Indian Open :wink, now he only holds three. Although to be fair, that's still more than any other player. He has only played at one major venue this season, in Shanghai, where he was seeded through and reached the semi-finals playing his B-game. The other three major events saw him either lose in the qualifiers in the UK, or not enter at all. Playing better outside of the UK was the pattern with him last season, and it looks like that might continue, even though it used to be largely the other way around. He had some good moments in the Champion of Champions, where he again reached the semi-finals, so we might see him playing well here. He has already won the UK twice in his career, although both times before the shorter format was introduced. He should have a fairly straightforward run to the last16 here. His biggest obstacles on paper should be Mark King and Andrew Higginson, both struggling in the qualifiers this season as well, but they both played alright last weekend and reached the last16. King in particular has been known to cause problems for Ding in the past. They played a good match in the 2013 WC, where King led 6-2 after the first session, but Ding came back very strongly in the second session to take control of the match. Higginson's match against Tian Pengfei could also be interesting here. Tian beat him in the German Masters last season, and also in the 2009 Shanghai Masters, when he was still a wildcard. He had a couple of quiet seasons, but played pretty well last season, so it's disappointing to see him struggling in the qualifiers again. He has only really played well in one of the Asian PTCs, but of course the season is far from over. Jimmy White's form is not very encouraging either. He lost to Zhou Yuelong in the 1st round in Mülheim, a player young enough to be his grandson, but I have a feeling that result will seem pretty normal in ten years' time, because Zhou is a great prospect. In any case, White will start favourite over Dave Harold, who is himself struggling pretty badly and has fallen way down in the rankings now.

Joe Perry has always done really well in the UK Championship, twice reaching the semi-finals, so it wouldn't be a big surprise at all if he went through. As expected, it took him a while to get over that defeat in the Wuxi Classic final, and he didn't win a match at the next two venues, but he finally got another win in the International Championship, beating Mike Dunn, whom he could play in the 2nd round here. Mark Davis also has good memories of the UK Championship. His run to the semi-finals here in 2012 remains the best result of his career so far. He already has another semi-final from this season, in the Australian Open, where he beat a number of strong players to reach that stage. He usually plays better when he is a bit of an underdog, but in this section he will have to accept the role of one of the favourites, so it will be interesting to see how he handles it. Unfortunately for Davis, Perry has a superb record over him, although they haven't met in any match of decent length since 2008. The other players here are outsiders, although I would perhaps give Jamie Jones a decent chance to do something. He hasn't had any great runs recently, certainly not comparable to his WC run in 2012, but he has at least reached a couple of 2nd rounds and such, which is a lot better than some other players in this tournament, particularly in this section.

Ding has a pretty reach history with both of his most likely last16 opponents here. He played Davis in the China Open way back in 2005, as a wildcard, and of course famously went on to win the tournament. He has also beaten him in both the UK and the WC since. Their 2011 UK clash went 6-5 to Ding, and somewhere in the back of my mind I have Davis' expression of disbelief in that match, but I can't quite remember what it was about. Was it a fluke Ding had on the colours in the decider, or did he win from needing a snooker? Something like that anyway. :smile: Davis got a bit of revenge by knocking Ding out of his home event, in the 2012 Wuxi Classic, and as I remember he went on to knock Robertson out of Australia as well that season. Ding and Perry played in the semi-finals of this tournament in 2005, when Ding was pretty much untouchable and won 9-4. They also played three times last season. Perry won their first match, in the Wuxi Classic, which puts him in a group of only five players to beat Ding in a major ranking event all season, but Ding won their matches in the German Masters and the Welsh Open, both at the business end of those tournaments. It's hard to place Ding in this tournament, on form he would obviously be one of the favourites, but he could just as easily play a bad tournament and go out early. He tends to play well when everyone starts forgetting about him though, so I make him the favourite to go through here. :wink:

Jamie Burnett v. Fraser Patrick
Ryan Day v. Lyu Chenwei
Aditya Mehta v. Alex Davies
Judd Trump v. Rouzi Maimaiti
Rod Lawler v. Alex Borg
Martin Gould v. Lee Page
Luca Brecel v. Noppon Saengkham
Mark Allen v. Eden Sharav

Arguably the toughest section of the draw, we could see some players play well here but still go out early. This was the part of the season last year where Judd Trump first showed any real form. This time he has started the season much better and has been among the five or six best performers in the first part. The highlight was his win in the Australian Open, his first major title in almost two years. He hasn't done too badly since then either. He reached the final of the Champion of Champions, where he lost to O'Sullivan in a very high-quality match, and he was also a semi-finalist yesterday, but he did bottle it a bit in the match against Murphy. Still, the signs are good for him ahead of a really important part of the season. The most dangerous player near him in the draw should be Ryan Day, who has played well himself so far this season. He has had several run to the last32 and last16 of events, but he hasn't reached the business end yet, and he has never reached the business end of the UK Championship either, even when he was a top8 player. He can compete with anyone in an open, attacking game though, so Trump has to be careful. They played in the 2nd round of the WC earlier this year, Trump winning comfortably, 13-7, in what was the only time they have ever played a match of decent length. Jamie Burnett is also in good form, having reached the quarter-finals of the International Championship recently, with wins over Stevens, Trump and Ebdon. I don't think I've ever seen Burnett play two good tournaments in a row since I've been watching snooker though, so perhaps the highlight of his season is already behind him. He has already played Day in the UK Championship on two occasions in the past, and Day won comfortably both times. Fraser Patrick could be a dangerous opponent for Burnett as well, although without a run in any of the major tournaments so far, he did play alright in the Ruhr Open. I will mention Aditya Mehta as well... It's hard to think of him as a ranking finalist, considering he never won any match longer than a best-of-7 in that tournament, but a final is a final, even if it's just a PTC, so he shouldn't be underestimated. Having said that, he has never had another notable run in any tournament before or since, not even to the quarter-finals, and the last time he played Trump over a best-of-11 he lost 6-0.

Further on in this section, Mark Allen stands out as a really strong contender. This season he has found a kind of consistency he never had before, and it's resulted in two ranking finals in a fairly short time, as well strong performances in the PTCs. He has shown great fighting qualities to come from behind in a lot of his matches as well, and players like that are usually tough to beat in the best-of-11 format. He will probably have to win a couple of tough matches before he can even start thinking about Trump though. Luca Brecel is a possible opponent for him in the 2nd round, as he returns to the place of his greatest success in snooker so far, the quarter-final in 2012. He could have gone further last year as well, he was 5-2 up on Maguire but somehow lost 6-5. This year he has done very little in the major events so far, but this would be a good place to start. Martin Gould on the other hand is enjoying quite a good season. He reached a major semi-final for the first time in his career in Wuxi, and he has followed it with at least a win at every venue since. He has only really lost to the top players so far this season, so that should make him pretty confident, although he will obviously need to beat a top player or two to advance here. He doesn't have much history with Allen in the major events, but they did play recently in the International Championship, Allen winning 6-4 from 3-0 down, in a high-quality match. Gould didn't play in the Ruhr Open, somewhat surprisingly perhaps, so it's been a while since he last played in a tournament. Rod Lawler also adds a bit of quality to this section. He had a slow start to the season (quite fitting for him :smile, but the International Championship saw him reach the last16, and he also got through his section in the Ruhr Open, before losing to Milkins in the quarter-finals.

Are we going to see another clash between Allen and Trump? For some reason they seem to bring out the best in each other, and they have played a number of classic matches in the past. It would of course be a repeat of the UK final in 2011, a tremendous match that showed both players at their best at various parts of the match, five centuries and a number of other high breaks between them. Trump prevailed 10-8 in the end, even though Allen was coming back at him really strongly in the final session. They also played two great matches in 2012, Allen winning 5-4 in the World Open, Trump winning 6-5 in the International Championship, with some one-visit snooker in both matches. That's why I expected a really great match when they met in the UK last year, but on that occasion they disappointed a little, and Allen won 6-4 in a pretty scrappy match. Day and Allen also have a pretty good rivalry, the highlight of which is their WC quarter-final in 2011, which Allen won 13-11. As for Trump and Gould, there was of course that thrashing Trump administered in the 2011 WC, but they haven't met in a major event since. Tough call here, but I will go with Trump. :wink:

Quarter 4:

Shaun Murphy v. James Wattana
Thepchaiya Un-Nooh v. Robin Hull
Liang Wenbo v. David Grace
Jack Lisowski v. Chris Melling
Marco Fu v. Ahmed Saif
Cao Yupeng v. Lyu Haotian
Michael Holt v. Zak Surety
Dechawat Poomjaeng v. Andrew Norman

Shaun Murphy goes into the UK Championship as the man in form, and I'm sure many will consider him as one of the big favourites following his excellent display yesterday. I will disagree to some extent though... Some players are often described as big-occasion players, because the biggest events bring out the best in them, so by that logic we could refer to Murphy as a small-occasion player, if it didn't sound a little insulting. He won this tournament in 2008, to add to his World title, but then entered a somewhat weird period of his career, where he went more than five years without winning another major title, even though he remained a prolific winner of minor events. Since 2008 he has won the Premier League, the Brazil Masters, the non-ranking Wuxi Classic, the PTC Grand Finals, and four single PTC titles, three of them this year. He has come to a big tournament on the back of minor titles several times, but he has often failed to back them back. He has only reached two major ranking quarter-finals in the last two seasons, the same as the struggling John Higgins, and yet one gets the impression Murphy is not really struggling at all. There is no particular reason why he shouldn't perform better in the bigger tournaments, particularly with his great fighting qualities, and the longer matches should suit him very well. He played some excellent stuff last weekend, no doubt about that, so the form is clearly there, and the confidence should be very high as well, especially following that excellent maximum break. Having said that, when he has faced other top16 players in major tournaments this season he has lost every time, so I will keep an eye on what happens here, regarding that statistic... Moving on from Murphy, there are a couple of other good players here. Robin Hull played some excellent snooker at the start of the season to reach the quarter-finals in Wuxi, but unfortunately he hasn't appeared at a major venue since. There could also be an intriguing 2nd round match between Jack Lisowski and Liang Wenbo here, two players who play snooker in very much the same way. Lisowski has shown very little all season, but for Liang the signs are more promising. He got to the last16 in the Ruhr Open, where he lost to Robertson, while his best in the majors is also a last16, in the Wuxi Classic. He is also a former quarter-finalist in this event, back during his purple patch in 2009, but he didn't have a realistic chance of beating the in-form John Higgins on that occasion. Liang and Lisowski are both very dependent on their daily form, so they are obviously both capable of beating each other, or anyone else for that matter, but I think Liang is the better and certainly the more mature player at this point in time. As for their chances against Murphy, it's going to be tough. Liang did beat Murphy on the way to his 2009 Shanghai Masters final, 6-5 in the semi-finals, and he also beat him in the Welsh Open last season. Lisowski has had less success, he lost to Murphy 5-4 in the 2013 China Open, even though he was playing extremely well in that tournament, but Murphy found a way to scrape through. They failed to meet in Wuxi this season as Lisowski went out a round too early, but they did play in Australia, Murphy once again prevailing 5-0.

The other big name in this section is Marco Fu, the only really high-profile victim of the early rounds last year. This season he has reached two major quarter-finals, which is alright, but he played so well last season that he should be looking for more. He is a former finalist of this event, back in 2008, but he is probably playing better snooker now than he was back then. He can be vulnerable in the early rounds, especially against lower-ranked players, so perhaps this section doesn't suit him all that much. He opens against Ahmed Saif, a really interesting coincidence, because Saif was the player who failed to score a point last season against Robertson, when Robertson made four centuries, and Fu was on the right end of the same scenario last weekend against Higgins. Fu to win 6-0 without conceding a point? Perhaps not. :smile: Michael Holt should be Fu's toughest opponent on paper. He too has done alright so far, but having reached a major semi-final and another quarter-final last season, his ambitions have probably risen, and he hasn't really repeated those results yet. He did reach a PTC final though, Ding proving too strong at the final hurdle. There is also a very interesting 1st round match between Cao Yupeng and Lyu Haotian here. Lyu has struggled since turning professional, mainly losing at the qualifying stage of tournaments, while Cao plays an occasional good tournament, followed by a series of bad ones. Unfortunately this season follows the same pattern, as Cao reached the last16 in Wuxi, only to lose in the qualifiers of all the following tournaments. They have never played before, so it will be interesting to see how it goes, but obviously Cao is the favourite. Cao was whitewashed by Fu in Shanghai last season, so the 2nd round here could be difficult for him, while Lyu surprisingly beat Fu in Shanghai the year before, still as a wildcard. Dechawat Poomjaeng is also here, without any good result behind him, but that could be slightly misleading, because the Thai players collectively withdrew from the first couple of events, so Poomjaeng, as well as Thepchaiya Un-Nooh and the other Thai players in different sections could be more dangerous than they seem.

If either Fu or Murphy falter in this section, it opens several possibilities for the last16 match, most of them quite intriguing, but I certainly won't complain if both favourites do the business either. Murphy against Fu would be a repeat of the 2008 final, which went down to the final frame, finishing past 1am CET, if I remember correctly. The match wasn't all that great in terms of quality, but it was full of drama and very exciting towards the end. Murphy has had the upper hand in their rivalry since then, thrashing Fu 13-3 with a session to spare at the Crucible in 2009, he also won at the Crucible this year, and he has had wins over Fu in the best-of-11 format in the 2012 International Championship and the 2014 Masters. Fu did win their most recent match though, 4-1 in the Champion of Champions a couple of weeks ago. I am in no way predicting a major failure for Murphy here, in case my earlier thoughts gave that impression, but I am still going for Fu to come through this section. :wink:

Jimmy Robertson v. Zhou Yuelong
Mark Williams v. Steven Hallworth
Yu Delu v. Oliver Lines
Stephen Maguire v. Lu Ning
David Gilbert v. Elliot Slessor
Mark Joyce v. Ratchayothin Yotharuck
David Morris v. Li Hang
Mark Selby v. Oliver Brown

An interesting section to conclude with... A couple of players who are in reasonably good form, starting with Stephen Maguire, who reached the semi-finals last weekend. It has been a typical Maguire season, with a couple of highlights, but also a lot of frustration and disappointment. His best result came at the very start, when he reached the quarter-finals of the Wuxi Classic, but since then he has failed to progress significantly in any major tournament. In the International Championship he lost to Noppon Saengkham 6-5 in the 1st round, even though he made seven breaks over 50, while his opponent made only one. I think this is a welcome return home for Maguire though, because the UK Championship and the Welsh Open seem to be his best tournaments in recent years, and he still finds himself at the business end quite regularly. He is of course also a former winner of this event, back in 2004, when he played just about as well as snooker can be played. Mark Williams could also be one of the outside favourites in this event, having reached the semi-finals of the International Championship recently, his first really good tournament in ages. He just missed out on the Champion of Champions, but he did play in the Ruhr Open and reached the quarter-finals, where Murphy proved too strong. Williams has also won this tournament on two occasions, and came as close as possible to winning it for the third time in 2010, when he was past snookers required in the frame he needed to win the final against Higgins. Williams doesn't have a particularly good record against Maguire though, and it was Maguire who prevailed 9-5 when they played in this tournament in 2007. It will be tough for anyone else to get past these two, but you never know. Yu Delu has won big matches before, and indeed beat O'Sullivan in the PTC Finals last season, but he is struggling quite badly at the moment. Oliver Lines is a promising player as well. He beat Selby in the qualifiers for the International Championship, but unfortunately he couldn't follow that up with a good performance at the venue. Whatever happens in this quarter with Maguire, Yu, Lines and Lu Ning, it will be a new experience for all of them, because they haven't played a single match between them before. Somewhat unusual. Jimmy Robertson against Zhou Yuelong could be another interesting 1st round match here. Both players reached the last32 of the Ruhr Open, so they are playing alright at the moment, but the history is on Robertson's side, as he has beaten Zhou twice in the wildcard round in China before. Zhou can be very dangerous though, he pushed Ricky Walden all the way in the International Championship, losing 6-5, and thus came the closest of anyone to beating him that week.

Mark Selby finds himself at the very bottom of the draw, as he has so often done in recent times. It's interesting, a lot of people thought Selby would win all kinds of titles now that pressure is off him somewhat, having finally won the World title. That may still happen of course, but I did have the feeling he would suffer a little drought in this first part of the season, and I think I said something along those lines before the Wuxi Classic. It's understandable that the motivation and the hunger isn't there for a while after you win a big title, perhaps that's why so few players performed well in the UK Championship and the Masters back to back in the 2006-2011 period, after the tournaments were first put together on the calendar. Of course you are more likely to take your foot off the gas during the new year celebrations if you have just won the UK. In Selby's case it was the summer break that probably saw him take things a bit easier, and he wasn't quite as sharp at the start of the season. But it's been half a year now, and it's time to start winning again! He got to the semi-finals in Shanghai with his usual strong B-game, and was close to winning as well before Allen came back at him, and he battled to a PTC title as well, so things have not been too bad. He then lost in the qualifiers for the International Championship, was thrashed 6-1 by a really strong Trump in the Champion of Champions, and he decided to skip the Ruhr Open as well, which is a little unusual for him. He comes to a triple crown event as the World champion and world number one for the first time here. Whether he is the best player in the world is debatable, but whether he is the king of best-of-11s is probably not. He has won a third of all best-of-11 tournaments he has ever played in, reached at least the final in more than half of them and at least the quarter-finals in three quarters (4/12, 7/12 and 9/12 respectively, if you want the exact numbers). There is clearly something about this format that brings out the best in him, and he should be very tough to beat again here. Who could stop him? Oliver Brown is his first opponent, it probably won't be him, but he did whitewash Ding the Wuxi qualifiers this season, so he clearly isn't afraid of the top players. Mark Joyce has got to the quarter-finals of this event in the past as well, in 2010 when the matches were still longer. David Morris and Li Hang both played well here last year as well. Morris got to the last16, while Li went out to Robertson in the last32, but still played a really good match against him. He also recently got to the last16 of the International Championship, beating Higgins 6-1 on his way, before losing to a strong O'Sullivan by the same scoreline. It should be an interesting 1st round match, with a slight edge to Li perhaps, since he won their match in the qualifiers for the Shanghai Masters this season. David Gilbert is the other seeded player here, also quite capable of doing something. He has only got past the 1st round of one major event this season, the International Championship, where he pushed Fu all the way, and he recently got to the last32 in Mülheim, where he lost to Murphy.

Selby has a nice rivalry with both of his most likely last16 opponents here. He has played Maguire four times in the best-of-11 format before and won three of them, but Maguire won the only time they meet over a longer distance. It was in the last16 of this tournament in 2010, and I still sometimes get angry about that match, because some idiot at the time decided not to put it on TV. Selby and Williams have met several times as well, including two ranking finals, so they know each other's game very well. I've always thought Selby's game suited Williams quite well, because Williams is also a player who isn't too bothered about which direction matches go in. He is as comfortable in high-break exchanges as he is in the scrappy stuff, and you can't really get under his skin that easily. He beat Selby 9-0 in this tournament in 1999, different times obviously, but he also won 9-7 when they played in 2008, even though Selby was closer to the top of the game than Williams at the time. It was a cracking match as well, Selby had four centuries, including three in a row as he was coming back to 7-7 from 7-3 down. Unfortunately the last two times they played Williams was poor, 6-1 and 5-1 defeats in tournaments last year, but I would expect a much closer match if they meet again here. Tough one to call between these three players but, when in doubt, go for Selby. :wink:

Possible QF lineup:

Neil Robertson v. Ricky Walden
Barry Hawkins v. Ronnie O'Sullivan
Ding Junhui v. Judd Trump
Marco Fu v. Mark Selby



So there we are, it promises to be a really good lineup at the business end. I wish everyone a great snooker week (or week and a half), and hopefully we can have some good discussions. :smile:

[inacion]

Very good analysis that's why I back Neil Robertson to win UK Championship to cashout on later stages. If he reaches quarter finals I will double up my investment at least.

[robertmac]

You either have an amazing memory or you have a lot
of information about past matches. Either way you have
a talent for analyzing a tournament and its players.

I would agree that in a 'normal' world your QF predictions
sounds very solid and I would agree however snooker is
such an unpredictable game that anything can happen.
I have my fave players in Robertson, Trump and Ding and
I hope they all do well but I hope for some excellent and
exciting snooker to enjoy. Thanks again for the awesome
write up.

Possible QF lineup:

Neil Robertson v. Ricky Walden
Barry Hawkins v. Ronnie O'Sullivan
Ding Junhui v. Judd Trump
Marco Fu v. Mark Selby

[sharkster63]

The following players are my favorite for betting odds/upsets and skill, I think they are capable of beating the big guys on the right day.
1. Scott Donaldson
2. Robbie Williams
3. Igor Figueiredo
4. Zhang Anda
5. Jamie Jones
6. Martin Gould
7. Thepchaiya Un-Nooh
8. Mark Joyce

Thanks for the great post Odrl

[Rocket147]

Excellent write-up, Odri.

[gavpowell]

If they keep this up, Ronnie will get half a dozen more world titles because he'll be the only one who's ever played over that sort of distance - all the younger players will be swooning at the prospect of best of 17s.

[inacion]

Barry Hawkins over 0.5 centuries @ 2.25, good value.