So here we are we are into the final day of the PTC2 with just 16 players remaining at the start of play and surely the favourite now has to be Ronnie O’Sullivan, though the likes of Ding Junhui, Graeme Dott, Judd Trump and Neil Robertson may have something to say about that. Click below for my updates throughout the day…
Arriving at the venue shortly before the start of play I headed on into the media room to polish off my report from yesterday before heading out to see some matches. Liam Highfield has made a good start to lead Ronnie O’Sullivan early on but already the former world champion has been able to draw level at one apiece…
Nipping upstairs to take a photo of the wonderful new bar up in the player’s lounge I caught a bit of the match between Ronnie and Liam from the marvellous view on offer from there, before heading in to watch frame four of the match between Rory McLeod and young Jak Jones. both players had chances but eventually it was taken by Jak following a poor safety from Rory which left a red over a corner pocket, as well as a timely fluke on the yellow for the Welshman.
Having added the next frame to lead 3-2 it looked like there might be another upset on the cards but to his credit Rory played an excellent two frames, finishing off the decider in one visit and only just falling short of a century with a missed black. He might not be the quickest player on the planet but make no mistake, Rory can certainly pot the balls. He will now meet Xiao Guodong who came through against what by all accounts was an unfortunate Jamie Burnett who had a poor run of the ball at times.
Elsewhere Liam Highfield was giving an excellent account of himself against Ronnie out on the arena table, moving 3-2 ahead following an excellent brown when attempting to clear. O’Sullivan though was not to give up and soon drew level at 3-3 to force what was a scrappy decider which saw both have chances to win it. Eventually though it was a missed green from Liam which was to be his last chance and Ronnie soon got back in to book his place in the quarter-finals. Full credit to Liam however, he will have gained a few new fans with his performances this week.
From one decider to another, Yu Delu was just finishing off a 4-3 win against Adam Duffy while on the next table Ding Junhui and Graeme Dott were also locked at 3-3. It was Graeme who gained the upper hand initially with a lead of 30 before a long safety battle ensured with both players keen to keep the cue ball as close to the bottom cushion as possible.
Eventually it was Ding who managed to get in, going into the lead with a break of 44 before missing a red with the rest up into the green pocket. Graeme then potted a red and tried to lay a snooker on the yellow in behind the black, but didn’t get it quite right and Ding soon took advantage with an excellent pot up into the green pocket before clearing to the blue to leave snookers required.
The most dramatic decider by all accounts however was that between Neil Robertson and Judd Trump which went all the way down to the final black. I managed to catch the final few shots and eventually it was to be a cruel finish for Neil as having come ever so close to doubling the black into a corner pocket, he could then only watch as the cue ball went in-off to send him out of the tournament. I did not see the rest of the match but did notice a tweet from Judd Trump:
“Glad everyone’s playing worse than me hell of a struggle.”
With the quarter-finals underway unfortunately the livescores were to falter for half an hour or so, but when they returned viewers will have seen that Judd Trump and Ding Junhui had both got off to an excellent start, each leading 3-0. Judd soon got over the line a 4-1 winner while at the time of writing Ding leads 3-1.
Slower going however for Xiao Guodong and Rory McLeod, Xiao having just gone into a 2-0 lead…