STAT ATTACK: German Masters

Having published my full preview of the German Masters, there's always room for more and that is what we have here with the Stat Attack. From head to heads to who has played in the most matches at the German Masters it's all here to add an extra insight...

When Stephen Maguire and Ken Doherty meet in round one it will be the first time the pair have met in any kind of ranking tournament since the 2011 Australian Open, when Doherty was a 5-2 winner.

Meanwhile, Judd Trump and Ali Carter have not met in a ranking event since the Last 16 of the 2012 World Championships when Carter came back to win 13-12. However, the pair have met six times in the Championship League since that match.

Alfie Burden and Zhang Anda have met four times in their careers, with Alfie winning on each occasion. However, the last of these matches was in qualifying for the 2012 International Championship.

Shaun Murphy has a similar record against Ben Woollaston, having never lost to Ben in four meetings, including the 2013 German Masters and most recently at this season’s UK Championship.

Amazingly enough, Martin Gould and Mark Williams have never met in the final stages of a major ranking event, so their meeting in round one will be the first of that kind.

Mark Joyce meanwhile comes into his first round match with Mark Allen having beaten Allen in three of their four previous matches, including this seasons Australian Open.

The first round meeting of Liang Wenbo and Ryan Day will be the pairs first since their quarter-final in this event a year ago, which Wenbo won in a deciding frame.

Meanwhile Fergal O’Brien and Stuart Bingham will meet in round one for the third time this season alone, Fergal winning the last three frames of both of the previous matches to win 5-4 in Australia and 4-3 in the Ruhr Open.

In the five stagings of the German Masters from 2011 to 2015 there has never been a repeat winner, with two of the previous winners in Ding and O’Sullivan failing to qualify for the venue this year.

 

Watch out for a decider in the final stages. There were 9 in the 2015 edition from the Last 32 stages onwards at the venue, with all four quarter-finals finishing 5-4.

Last years finalists Mark Selby and Shaun Murphy have both played in the exact same amount of matches in their German Masters history (23), with Selby winning 19 and Murphy 18 after Shaun lost to Mark in that final.

 

Shaun Murphy is also the highest money winner out of anyone never to have won the event.

Michael Holt could be a man to watch this week in Berlin, having on 4 occasions already this season fallen to the eventual tournament winner.

 

Looking further into the event, not only did Wenbo beat his first round opponent in the 2015 edition, but there is potential that he could meet Stuart Bingham in the last 16 for the second year running after Liang beat Stuart 5-4 in that round a year ago.

 

Interesting statistics to chew over then before defending champion Mark Selby gets the event underway, while it has also been announced that Neil Robertson will join the Eurosport punditry team for the event after failing to qualify.