World Championship Day Seven.

Day seven at the Crucible and there is really only one place we can start.

Defending champion Mark Selby crashed out of the tournament tonight,going down 13-9 to Anthony McGill in as big a shock result as we've seen here in a long time to prove the Crucible curse for first time returning champions remains alive and well.

These two played out a highly entertaining first session yesterday which ended level at 4-4,but it was McGill who started the better this morning.taking three of the first four to lead 7-5 at the interval.A run of  83 from Selby closed him within one again at 7-6,but McGill dominated the next three frames to end the session 10-6.

So the question going into the final session was could the young Scot playing at the Crucible this year for the first time finish off the job or would Selby do,well a "Selby" and dig himself out of trouble. With all this in mind the first frame was always going to be crucial and it was Selby who made the early running with a series of great shots,only to carelessly run out of position when among the balls. From here McGill produced as magnificent a break 68 as you could see under pressure to go 11-6.

A 67 in the next closed Selby to 11-7,but another immaculate break,this time a 87,from McGill moved him th the hill at 12-7. Selby is a fighter though and he pulled the next two back to keep his faint hopes alive at 12-9.The problem for him though was that no matter what he did McGill was always at some stage going to get a chance to win it and he was playing too well to let it slip by if it came.Thats what happened in the next as McGill closed out a famous victory with a run of 82 and seal his 13-9 win.

The biggest victory of his career so far then for McGill and I think what will have impressed people the most was the way he looked around the table,always comfortable,smiling and actually seeming to be enjoying what he was doing.Add to this undoubted ability and I think we can be sure,regardless of how the rest of this tournament goes,that here is a young man who we will be hearing quite a lot of.

For Selby,he will feel disappointed that he couldn't put up a better defence of his title,but this has been on the whole a disappointing season for him.I know that sounds strange to say of someone who won two ranking titles,but on closer examination how well did he play to win those? He now has a couple of months to reflect on things and I'm sure next season he will be back to the tough a granite Selby we are used too.

In other action today DIng Junhui has completely turned things around against John Higgins to hold a 9-7 lead going into their final session in the morning having started this afternoon 5-3 down. Higgins will no doubt be regretting not taking control of this game last night when he lead 5-1 and he will be even more frustrated by the number of unforced errors he produced this afternoon.He is a four time champion here though and if he can find his game in the morning we could be in for a grandstand finish to this one.

Another Scot in much graver trouble is Graeme Dott,who must somehow find his very best form if he is to trouble Stuart Bingham here as he trails the Englishman 11-5 overnight.

Also in the early stages of their second round encounter re Mark Allen & Barry Hawkins with the Ulsterman holding a 5-3 lead after the early skirmishes,

 The day though belongs to Anthony McGill.Well done young man.

World Championship Day Six.

Day Six of the championship finally saw the conclusion of the round one matches as well as the first shots fired over the bows of round two.

Starting out today with a 7-2 lead I'm sure Judd trumps thoughts were of a comfortable afternoon hoping to finish it off before the interval,but Stuart Carrington had different ideas and started like a man possessed here,taking three of the first four frames with runs of 97,74 & 70 to close to 8-5.It was play like this last week that earned him his debut here at the Crucible and his regret here will be that he didn't find it earlier when he may  well have made a real match of it.AS it was it was too little too late as Trump won the two more he needed to clinch a 10-6 win.

Trump is many peoples idea of a winner of this event and his performance here will have only given his fans even more reason to believe this may be his year.The same could also be said for the suppoters of Shaun Murphy who put the finishing touches of his match with Robin Hull in style,running out a 10-3 winner,

Of the second round matches that started today Mark Selby is level with Anthony McGill 4-4 after a very entertaining first session and John Higgins leads Ding Junhui 5-3

So 16 players now remain in with a chance of collecting that famous trophy come May 4th and really we are no nearer knowing which of them it will be.Purely on performances in that first round you would say Robertson,Murphy & Trump are all cuing as well as they can,but how hard were they pushed? There are in all probability six who you would consider as a realistic potential winners. Its going to be a fascinating weekend.

Round Two                                     Predictions
Mark Selby v Anthony McGill   (Selby 13-10)
Joe Perry v Shaun Murphy         ( Murphy 13-7)
Barry Hawkins v Mark Allen      (Allen 13-9)
Ali Carter v Neil Robertson         (Robertson 13-5)
Ding Junhui v John Higgins         (Higgins 13-10)
Judd Trump v Marco Fu              (Trump 13-9)
Graeme Dott v Stuart Bingham    (Dott 13-11)
Matthew Stevens v Ronnie O'Sullivan  (O'Sullivan 13-6)

World Championship Day Five.

Day five at the Crucible and I think its fair to say this wont go down as one of the tournaments more competitive days.

First up this morning Ronnie O'Sullivan completed the job he started yesterday against Craig Steadman,finishing with a 10-3 victory. Yes its true that if Ronnie is to win a fifth title next weekend he will have to play better than he did here,but that said it was apparent  early on that he wouldn't have to play better than this to win this match and he did look at times in fine rhythm.

Next up for Ronnie is Matthew Stevens who quickly put his match with Mark Williams to bed starting the afternoon with a 7-2 and quickly getting the three he needed to round off a 10-2 win.

In the other match finished today Joe Perry saw off Zhang Anda with what in the end was a 10-4 scoreline,but it briefly threatened tonight to become a lot closer than that. Perry had established an 8-1 lead this morning ,but Zhang to his credit came out all guns blazing to win the first three tonight to close to 8-4.The next frame was a real tense affair that went to the colours,but it was eventually decided when Perry potted a superb long blue and followed it with the pink & black to go 9-4.With that ended any hopes of a comeback and Perry put it to bed in the next to seal the 10-4 win.

Elsewhere two of the real contenders for this title finally got their first round matches underway in impressive fashion as both Judd Trump & Shaun Murphy hold 7-2 leads over Stuart Carrington & Robin Hull respectively

They play to a finish tomorrow where we also see the start of Round two with Mark Selby starting out against Anthony McGill and,in what on paper looks the tie of the round Ding Junhui begins his tussle with John Higgins.

World Championship Day Four.

One of the real beauties of watching sport is the unpredictability that each event brings.Last year Ding Junhui came to the Crucible very much the man in form having collected five ranking titles through the season,but crashed out to Michael Wasley,This time around he comes here on the back of an awful season ,but there may just be signs that he is starting to find his game again.

In the first session of his match with Mark Davis he was all at sea early on trailing 4-0,but it had seemed he'd weathered the storm escaping from session 4-3 and so it proved today as Davis had no answer for Dings heavier scoring,with the Chinese running out a 10-7 victor.Just how much he was concentrating was apparent in frame nine when it was only after potting the thirteenth red and playing up for the blue that he realised he had actually been on for a 147.

Speaking in terms of Ding having a tough year though does pale into insignificance when you think about the health battles off the table that Ali Carter has faced since he last graced the games biggest stage.The welcome he received here from the Crucible crowd I'm sure will stay with him for a long time and once again  he showed his liking for the place with a comfortable 10-5 win over the dogged Scot Alan McManusThe damage here was done early on when he extended his 5-3 overnight advantage to 7-3 and from there never looked back.

One of the seeds I had thought might be vulnerable here was Mark Allen who has fallen off the radar in recent months following an excellent first half of the campaign.Here he faced Ryan Day & it was the Welshman who took the early initiative to lead 3-1. From here though Allen found his best form to reel off nine frames on the bounce to ease through to the second round 10-3.

Elsewhere in matches that started today Ronnie holds a 7-2 lead over Craig Steadman after a bizarre  session that started with a failed maximum attempt from O'Sullivan and ended with him wearing tournament director Mike Ganley's shoes!

The this evening we had the rematch of the 2000 final here between Mark Williams & Matthew Stevens,Suffice it say that this session didn't live up to the standard we saw then as both players struggled,but Stevens strgulled the better to take an overnight lead of 7-2.

So there you have it a day of failed Maximum attempts ( although its debatable if you can call it a failed attempt when the player doesn't realise its on) & shoes swapping. What can day five bring!!

World Championship- Quick Round Up Of Action So Far

Well the world championship is three days old and anyone wondering what makes this tournament so special need wonder no more after some of the drama we've seen so far.Before I get into that though,I must apologize for lack of blog action over weekend,I was laid low by a bug that I will spare you the details of,but now thankfully seems to be behind me.

Anyway back to the snooker and first up on Saturday we had Mark Selby take on Kurt Maflin..If Selby is defend his title here this year he is going to have to defy any number of so called curses,but the main stumbling block may well be that he simply isn't playing well enough.Now I know that is always a dangerous thing to say with Selby as he so often finds a way to win from nowhere in matches,but as I said in my preview,that surely catches up with you eventually.

The tale of the tape in this one  was Selby going into an 8-4 lead before Maflin won five on the spin to go to the brink at 9-8.Maflin did have chances to close it out in the next two frames,but it was not to be as Selby did what Selby does,snatching victory from jaws of defeat to go through 10-9.

His opponent in the next round had to come through a thriller of his own,but Anthony McGill did just that to confirm his status as one of the games up and coming stars,beating fellow Scot Stephen Maguire 10-9.

McGill had the upper hand in this from the get go and smooth progress looked likely when he move into  9-5 lead.Maguire though suddenly started to find something and fought back to level at 9-9.Here McGill showed remarkable nerve to roll in a break of 122 to seal his place in second round.

The other  dramatic deciding frame match we've had involved Barry Hawkins & Matt Selt.That looked unlikely when Hawkins moved 9-4 clear this morning,but he seems to make a habit of letting big leads slip and Selt produced some stunning snooker to level it at 9-9.Hawkins must have been thinking "not again".after letting a 5-0 lead over Nigel Bond at the UK somehow become a -6-5 defeat,but here he held himself together to take his one at his second bite of the cherry in the decider.

The evidence of recent months has been that John Higgins had started to find some real form again and here he produced possibly his best performance at the Crucible since he lifted the title in 2011.in beating Robert Milkins 10-5

The performance of the championship so far though has come from Neil Robertson who eased past Jamie Jones 10-2 with a heavy barrage of scoring the Welshman just had no answer to which included three centuries.

Elsewhere Graeme Dott came through a real topsy turvy encounter with Ricky Walden 10-8,Marco Fu beat Jimmy Robertson 10-6 & Stuart Bingham eventually fell over the line to beat Robbie Williams 10-7 in quite awful second session.

In matches to a finish tomorrow Ali Carter leads Alan McManus 6-3 & Mark Davis leads Ding Junhui 4-3 after a lengthy afternoon session saw them only complete only 7 of their 9  frames.We also have entrance of a certain Mr O'Sullivan in the afternoon session

World Championship 2015 Preview

After a season of, mixed results for some of our biggest stars,the return to the winners circle for an all tine great,and two new members of the ranking titles club the eyes of the snooker world once again focus on the Crucible for 17 days of drama on the baize.

So who will claim the title.Well I suppose there is only place to start and that is with our defending champion Mark Selby. Its been a strange old season for Selby.He really seemed to struggle in the early part of it,but victories in both the German Masters & the China Open will have him coming here with every confidence he can be the first first time returning champion to retain the title.The thing for me though is,even in those two tournaments he won,Selby did not play brilliantly the whole way through.Now there is an argument that  this is just the Selby way and what makes him unique is his ability to still dig out the victories,but I'm not sure you can win a world title depending so heavily on your " B"game,so for that reason I don't see him being the man to break the "Crucible Curse"

What then of the man he beat in last years final,.the five time champion Ronnie O'Sullivan? On the face of its it hasn't been a bad season for Ronnie as he claimed a second Champion of Champions title and  fifth UK Championship with thrilling victories over Judd Trump in both,but there have been signs since the turn of the year that all is not well with "The Rocket".On several occasions he has seemed quite angry.most noticeably at the Welsh Open and he also withdrew from the recent China Open apparently due to the return of the glandular fever that laid him low a few years back.It has also been recently reported that he has cut down n his sessions with Dr Steve Peters,but I understand they have resumed in the last few weeks.

So we're back to the eternal question,Which Ronnie will show up in Sheffield next week? Well I have no doubt that had he won a sixth title last season that Ronnie would be collecting his seventh come May 4th,but with that defeat and everything that has come since he may well be a a little vulnerable here.That said though,the draw has been kind enough to him and if he is anywhere near his best he really shouldn't have much trouble until at least the semi finals.What happens from there is anyones guess.

That brings us Ronnies potential semi final final opponent Judd Trump.These two have met this season in three epic finals,with Judd finally getting the better of things in the recent World Grand Prix. When Judd burst into everyones living rooms with his swashbuckling run to the final in 2011 comparisons were been immediately been made with the games other great crowd pleasers,but up to this year I had always seen him as more of a "White" than an "O'Sullivan".What we have seen recently though has forced me to revise my opinion a little as he has shown when in the mood that he also possesses a strong safety game.Bearing all this in mind he may well give this championship a good run this year.

Hoping to put an indifferent season behind him here will be 2010 champ, Neil Robertson.It seems a long time ago since Robertson won the first ranking title of the season taking the Wuxi Classic and although he did a PTC in Poland and reached a couple more finals he has largely struggled for the consistency we've come to expect from the Aussie..The one plus for him here is a kind enough quarter of the draw and it may allow him time to play himself into the tournament.

Also hoping to find something in Sheffield will be Ding Junhui,who after a record breaking season last time around has had an awful time of it over the last twelve months.He show signs of a return to form in China the other week,but he has been handed a very tough first round opponent in Mark Davis and even were he to win that he is in a very tough quarter of the draw.All in all I don't see this as the year of the first Chinese World Champion.

Of the others worth mentioning there are a few players who would need a strong tail wind to lift the title,like former champion Shaun Murphy who played superbly to lift the Masters in January,but would need to,at the very least,rediscover the form he showed for that fortnight in 2005 to be troubling the engraver this time. You can also throw into that category former winners John Higgins & Mark Williams,both have shown glimpses of their very best form in the last few months,but I just don't think at this stage either man still has the game  to add to their totals.

There are others there of course who will be thinking that this is the year that they will be adding their name the the Crucible roll of honour,but I would be majorly shocked if the winner came from outside any of the names mentioned above.

As for who I think will win it? I believe this may be Trumps year.

Recommended bets 
Judd Trump to win the title : 6/1
Value First Round Lucky 15: Graeme Dott (8/5) Anthony McGill (11/4) Ryan Day (2/1) Mark Davis (9/4)

First Round Draw
Mark Selby v Kurt Maflin
Stephen Maguire v Anthony McGill
Joe Perry v Zhang Anda
Shaun Murphy v Robin Hull
Barry Hawkins v Matt Selt
Mark Allen v Ryan Day
Ali Carter v Alan McManus
Neil Robertson v Jamie Jones
Ding Junhui v Mark Davis
John Higgins v Robert Milkins
Marco Fu v Jimmy Robertson
Judd Trump v Stuart Carrington
Ricky Walden v Graeme Dott
Stuart Bingham v Robbie Williams
Mark Williams v Matthew Stevens
Ronnie O'Sullivan v Craig Steadman

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China Open Final Selby Canters to Final Success.

Mark Selby will head to Sheffield to defend his World title  in a fortnight brimming with confidence after claiming the season penultimate prize with a comfortable 10-2 over Gary Wilson in todays China Open final.

This win,his second ranking title of 2015 following on from his triumph in the German Masters in February and his sixth ranking in total, couldn't be coming at a better time for the Leicesterman who had been struggling for form for much of the season.

What we saw here this week was typical Selby,not the prettiest to watch at times,but,as always it was backed up with the dogged determination we have come to expect and to be fair his form did improve in the semi final & final.

Of the final itself,well it may well have been a lot closer had Wilson,playing in his first ranking final,made the most of some early chances,but it was Selby who gradually pulled away,taking an 8-1 lead out the the first session the highlight of which was a tournament high break of 145.

From here it was always going to be an early finish and Selby quickly put it to bed when play resumed,running out an easy 10-2.

For Wilson,he will be disappointed he couldn't make more of a fight of it ,but he is a player certainly going the right way with his career and he can look back on a superb week that saw him beat home favourite Ding Junhui 6-5 in the semi final.

His attention,like  that of the rest of the snooker world will now turn this week to the World Championship qualifiers which begin on Wednesday.