O'Sullivan wins Championship League group one

Ronnie O'Sullivan stormed to victory in Group one of the Championship League, with an unbeaten record in his eight games played throughout both the round robin and knockout stages. He looked to be on top form today particularly with plenty of centuries, passing the 800 mark in his career as a whole.

Robert Milkins was the runner-up in the group, losing to Ronnie 3-0 in the final, after finishing third in the round robin stages and beating Mark Williams in the semi-finals. Fourth placed Ricky Walden was also whitewashed by Ronnie in the semi-finals.

Barry Hawkins went from second place overnight to a fifth placed group finish overall after losing his final two group games today, meaning that he will move on to group two with Mark Williams, Ricky Walden and Robert Milkins.

A single win was never going to be enough for Ryan Day to avoid relegation as he finished dead last in the group, while John Higgins was also eliminated after finishing sixth in the group on frames won, after only two match wins and 9 frames won in six matches.

With Ronnie moving on to the Winners Group which is still a couple of months away, while Day and Higgins have been eliminated it means that three more players step in. Those players are world number 1 Mark Selby and former Championship League winners in Judd Trump and Joe Perry.

Overall that means that Robert Milkins will be the only one of the seven competitors not playing in next weeks Masters so he will have this event as his lone focus, which may be the reason he did so well in the opening group over the last couple of days.

Mark Selby will meet Ricky Walden on at least one occasion ahead of their meeting in the Masters next week. Walden showed some good form today making the two of the highest breaks of the group, runs of 138 and 133 both featuring against Barry Hawkins. Joe Perry will also meet his Masters opponent Barry Hawkins at least once, and it will be interesting to see how Barry in particular performs there given his poor Masters record and lucky 5th place survival in group one.

Mark Williams and Judd Trump will be looking to find some form also, with Williams seeing what his Masters opponent had to offer by winning group one, while Judd will want to send out a message in response to Ronnie's brilliant play over the last couple of days. His name is certainly one of the top on the list of Masters contenders so he'll want to cement his name in peoples thoughts by playing well over the next couple of days.


That is what we have to look forward to over the next couple of days, and despite a very busy day for myself personally I will be back for the usual round-up at some point after the first days play has been completed.