Ronnie O'Sullivan and Ding Junhui were able to set-up a magnificent Welsh Open final, and the final I predicted before the tournament even started, with brilliant performances in their respective semi-final matches yesterday.
Barry Hawkins started off with a century in his semi-final against Ronnie yesterday, but then had to suffer as O'Sullivan won 2 frames on the black with sublime clearances and made 3 centuries as a helpless Barry Hawkins had very few chances and suffered a 6-2 defeat.
Ding Junhui was also in superb form though in his match with Joe Perry today, dominating the early stages of the match to go from 1-0 down to 1-3 ahead at the interval. Perry soon put Ding under pressure though with 2 good frames to level at 3-3, before Ding Junhui took control again with a 2 superb breaks of 55 and 88 to move 5-3 ahead, before a 69 from Perry made it 4-5. Then we saw one of the better breaks of the tournament as Ding pulled off several pots when many players would have played safe, to keep the break going as he went on to make a match winning total clearance of 118.
Yesterday's semi-final results:
Ding Junhui 6-4 Joe Perry
Ronnie O'Sullivan 6-2 Barry Hawkins
Final Preview:
Ronnie O'Sullivan Vs Ding Junhui - Ding Junhui and Ronnie O'Sullivan have been a cut above every other player not only this week, but throughout the season as Ronnie has won the Masters and the Champion of Champions so far this season of the selected events that he has entered, while Ding Junhui has entered much more, and won 3 ranking events in a row earlier in the season taking the Shanghai Masters, Indian Open and International Championship titles, before winning his 4th of the season last month at the German Masters. Both have pulled out sublime snooker this week, that I believe only these 2 players can produce, which makes this final an even bigger prospect. Both have been brilliant when they needed to be, with Ding making 2 centuries to come from 4-2 down to beat Joel Walker 4-3 in the quarter-finals and going up another couple of gears from 3-3 in the semi-finals to win 6-4. As for Ronnie, he hadn't been at his sublime best all week, but hadn't needed to be until last night when he went up about 3 gears sensing the threat that Hawkins could produce, and ultimately leaving him helpless as O'Sullivan produced the snooker of the week. We all know the benefits that Ronnie has been able to reap by skipping events this year, but Ding has also been quite tactical, missing the Championship League events and the last Euro Tour event, making this his first event since he won the German Masters. Ronnie has been playing some of the best snooker of his career at the moment, and I think only highly improved Ding Junhui both tactically and mentally can get anywhere near him, and if he can put O'Sullivan under pressure we will have a real game on, which Ronnie hasn't really had all week. I predicted this final at the events start, and then tipped Ding to win it back then, and I believe he could pull off what many would consider an upset today, but it certainly wouldn't surprise me.
Prediction: 9-7 to Ding Junhui
Whatever happens it will be a really entertaining final to end this good week of snooker from the Newport centre in Wales. I hope you all enjoy it as much as I will.
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