This evening saw the last two quarter-finals come to a conclusion, click below to read all about the two matches…
Mark Allen 5-2 Barry Hawkins
World number 16 Mark Allen booked a spot in the semi-finals tonight with an excellent 5-2 win against the in-form Barry Hawkins.
Unfortunately the match was not on the TV table but those in the crowd will have seen a great performance from Mark who started the match with the first of what would turn out to be three century breaks. Although Barry took the second frame runs of 41 and 105 ensured that it was the man from Northern Ireland who would go into the interval 3-1 up.
Hawkins kept fighting as they shared the next couple of frames, but Allen wrapped it up with a 112, completing a very impressive performance.
Allen is a player who I really rate and after a couple of poor events by his standards, it was only a matter of time before he began to fire again. I said at the start of the season that I fancied him to win a ranking event if things went right for him and the way the draw has unfolded, it might just be that this is his time. Either way it will be a good experience for him and the 3,200 ranking points already in the bag will help him to retain his top 16 spot for another year.
Neil Robertson 5-2 Stephen Maguire
In a week where a number of struggling players have seen a return to form, Australia’s Neil Robertson has got in on the act and defeated Stephen Maguire to reach his first semi-final since the 2007 Welsh Open.
The match promised to be the most interesting of the day and early on it lived up to the billing as both players traded big breaks, 59 and 75 for Neil, 122 and 81 for Stephen as they went into the interval all-square.
Things changed after the break though as Maguire’s safety game seemed to desert him and he allowed Robertson in who was more than able to continue hammering in the big breaks with 75 and 52 to lead 4-2. Maguire looked like he was going to get back into it as he made a break of 50, but a simple missed yellow proved to be the killer as Robertson countered with 74 for frame and match.
This is a great return to form for Neil who has gone on record as saying that he wants to go back to the attacking style of play that won him those two ranking titles in 2006/7. Coming into the event ranked at 21st provisionally, he needed this kind of run to give him a chance of keeping a top 16 spot and hopefully now he will have the confidence to go on to do so. His match against Mark Allen in the next round will not be easy by any means, but he is more than capable of winning it and going on to win title number three, his first outside of the UK.
Stephen Maguire though will be disappointed not to go further than the quarter-final and really capitalise on Ronnie O’Sullivan’s absence from the event and reduce the gap at the top of the standings. I’m not sure exactly what it is with Stephen this season but he’s not playing badly, he just seems to be missing something and I can’t put my finger on it. He has generally been solid enough and reached the quarters and semi-finals, but he has been quite inconsistent from one match to the next and hasn’t really built up a great run of form. He’ll be hoping that things come together at the UK Championship now, the tournament he won four years ago.