Shaun Murphy lost 4 of the last five frames from 3-2 ahead against Marco Fu to go out to an impressive performance from his opponent for the second year running, and at the same stage of the UK Championships for the third year in a row. Liang Wenbo is Fu's next opponent after he completed more comeback heroics against Tom Ford. He was 2-0 down early on before levelling at 2-2 at the mid-session break, but soon found himself 5-3 behind. Ford had chances in the remaining frames but Liang was dominant and came back to win 6-5, inducing load cries of "COME ON".
David Grace has gotten to the quarter-finals of a full ranking event for the first time after he beat a very under par Peter Ebdon 6-2. Ebdon could not get into the match early and despite levelling at 1-1 he lost all of the next four missing straightforward shots and failing to put anything together. In fact at 5-1 up David Grace's pot success was only 84% which is very low for the last 16 of a major but it didn't matter as he was able to hang on and get the win. Meanwhile, Matt Selt has also made it into the quarter-finals to deny young Luca Brecel his second appearance in the last 8 of the UK's. Brecel started brightly taking a 3-1 interval lead before losing all of the next four frames as his long potting in particular went astray. He did manage to pull a frame back to trail 4-5 but was not able to take his chances to force a final frame and Selt ran out a 6-4 victor.
Martin Gould was pretty comfortable in the end as he beat Joe Swail 6-3. Martin trailed after a scrappy opening 2-1, but started to find his range as he took the next four in a row to lead 5-2. Swail was able to get one frame back, but despite the chances he had in the match, could not make it any closer. John Higgins was not as comfortable when he took on Jamie Burnett. The signs were good early as John took 3-0 and 4-1 leads but he started to lose focus and Jamie took advantage of his failings to win the next three and level at 4-4. He had good chances in frame nine and frame ten but John capitalised on his opponents errors with a century and a cool clearance to take out the match, much to his relief.
Last 16 Results:
David Grace 6-2 Peter Ebdon
Martin Gould 6-3 Joe Swail
Liang Wenbo 6-5 Tom Ford
Marco Fu 6-4 Shaun Murphy
Neil Robertson 6-1 Stephen Maguire
John Higgins 6-4 Jamie Burnett
Matt Selt 6-4 Luca Brecel
Mark Selby 6-1 Dechawat Poomjaeng
Quarter-Final Preview: (Picks in Bold)
Martin Gould Vs David Grace - You would not have necessarily made these two the favourites to get to the quarter-finals at the start of the event but they have both played well and come through some tight matches to make it here. Gould has beaten Mark Allen most notably and looked in good form scoring well but also looking sharp in the safety department, which is one of his biggest recent improvements. David Grace has come out of nowhere in the sense that I have not really expected him to win a single one of his matches as yet, and his ranking event best was the Last 16 which he made in the Shanghai Masters in September as the beneficiary of a Last 32 walkover. He has played well this week at times, though he did not really have to in the last round against Peter Ebdon who was incredibly under par. Grace is going to have to step it up if he is to beat Martin here as he has been improving all year, as shown by his appearances in the World Grand Prix semi-finals and the Australian Open final and another couple of wins in this event are certainly not out of reach.Marco Fu Vs Liang Wenbo - Marco Fu and Liang Wenbo have both been very impressive in this tournament so far but particularly in the last couple of rounds. Fu played very well in defeating Shaun Murphy, though was aided by his opponent missing a few of his usual attacking shots. Liang Wenbo has been the comeback king so far this week in his wins over Judd Trump, 6-4 from 4-1 behind, and Tom Ford, 6-5 from 5-3 down. In fact in every single one of his matches he has won at least three frames in a row so can reel frames off with big breaks as well as any player. Both players will have their eyes on not just the semi-finals but making it to a major final and you would not begrudge either one of them of that. Marco deserves another crack at a major final, particularly after his heart breaking loss in the 2008 UK final, while it would be great to see a character like Liang go on and get to major final and go on to win it also. Wenbo is a quality player and it is not as often as others that he actually shows this. He is playing well this week and proving very tough to beat this week, while Marco did miss a few balls against Murphy looking to close the match out which is very unusual for Fu. This is certainly one match that could go either way.
Neil Robertson Vs John Higgins - This is by far the match of the round, and amazingly the first time that these two guys have met each other in a ranking event since the 2013 Wuxi Classic final. That almost shows the timeline of John in the year in a half after that final, as it took him so long to get back to his best. Now he seems to be there though he is proving a tough match for everyone and will certainly be so again here for Neil. Robertson has been flying in the last two rounds against Thepchaiya Un-Nooh and Stephen Maguire making centuries for fun, just as did on the way to winning the title back in 2013, and blowing his opponents out of the water. For me Robertson is a massive favourite to win the title if he can carry his form on for the next three rounds and John knows his safety and scoring will have to be on top form which they were not in the middle of his match against Jamie Burnett when he lost four out of five frames from 3-0 and 4-1 to 4-4. Only the consistent levels of performance shown in the International Championship will do here otherwise it will be Neil making the semi-finals.
Mark Selby Vs Matt Selt - Right at the bottom of the draw world number 1 Mark Selby seemed to be back at the top of his form against Dechawat Poomjaeng as he was in the first two rounds, before what can only now be seen as a blip against Jamie Jones. His scoring and safety have looked good in the matches he has won convincingly while his battling qualities have been outstanding once more when they have had to be, making him very hard to beat. In fact he is probably playing better now than when he won the UK title in 2012, where he had to hang on in a number of matches throughout the competition. Matt Selt has reached another ranking event quarter-final, but is yet to go one better than that in a full ranking event so it will be interesting to see what he does on this occasion. Selt has not really played his best this week and has had to grind and scrap his way through the draw, waiting for dips in his opponents performances which he got against Robbie Williams and Luca Brecel as it appeared that they both had chances throughout the match. One thing he will have to do here is play much better as there is no way to really grind Selby down and his experience in the latter stages of tournaments is far too great to lose to anything over than Matt's very best game.
Again, with four non-top 16 players into the quarter-finals there are still some huge opportunities for certain players to really make a move in the rankings with £30,000 guaranteed for those making the last four, a jump of £10,000 on what quarter-final losers will take home. With all of these matches taking place on Friday we will soon have a fantastic idea of who the favourites are for this tournament, with 2012 and 2013 champions Mark Selby and Neil Robertson standing out so far, but plenty of others (particularly in the top half of the draw) have a great chance to stake their claims and put a new name on the trophy as the 2015 champion.
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