Stephen Maguire put in the performance of the Last 32 on day three of the Shanghai Masters as he smashed Shaun Murphy 5-0. Maguire had made a maximum in his wildcard match on Tuesday amongst a total of three centuries in that match, so Murphy was always in for a tough game but not many would have seen this scoreline coming. Maguire took the opener after a classy 65, but Murphy's best chance of getting a frame on the board came in frame two when he was in first with an 57. Maguire then made 62 but missed frame ball pink, before clinching the frame at the second time of asking. Breaks of 75 and 121 followed from the Scot without conceding a point in those two frames ahead of the interval. Maguire could be forgiven for taking his foot off the gas slightly in frame five, but you could also forgive Murphy for thinking of the journey home and seeing his wife and son, after becoming a father for the first time little over a couple of weeks ago.
Barry Hawkins will be next to face the Maguire barrage after handing out punishment of his own for Robert Milkins in his own 5-0 win. Despite the scoreline Milkins scored at least 20 points in every frame, and Hawkins will need to offer up less opportunities to his in form opponent tomorrow.
Also on the non-televised tables today there were a couple of seeded casualties as Mark Williams and Joe Perry both bowed out. Williams was the most surprising as he fell to new Chinese professional Mei Xi Wen 5-3, having taken a 2-0 lead and sitting well in frame three. Mei joins Ding as the Chinese representatives in the Last 16, finishing off the match with a 117, his highest break of the match. Perry lost out to Stuart Carrington in a strange match that saw Carrington go 2-0 ahead before losing four frames in a row for Perry to lead 4-2 and put himself one away from a routine victory. Carrington had other ideas though as the World Open runner-up from July only scored another seven points in the match, with breaks of 78, 85 and a century in the decider seeing the much lower ranked of the two into the Last 16.
Neil Robertson was the upset of the earlier session on day three, going out 5-2 to Ryan Day in a match that, surprisingly for two heavy scorers, did not feature a single break of 50 or above. Day will not mind the lower quality of the match though as he marches on to face Mei Xi Wen in the Last 16.
There were easy victories for three more seeded players on the day, as Trump and Bingham completed whitewash victories and Ali Carter beat Kurt Maflin 5-1 on one of the non-televised tables, finishing off the Norwegian with a break of 104. Trump benefited from a very poor showing from Ben Woollaston, while Bingham didn't give Jamie Jones much of a look in. The Welshman only scored a total of 36 points in the match while the 2015 World Champion and former Shanghai Master finished with two centuries in frames four and five in a very pleasing performance.
With the Last 32 finally complete, this is how the line-up looks for Thursday's Last 16:
7.30am UK Time:
Barry Hawkins Vs Stephen Maguire
Stuart Bingham Vs David Gilbert
Ryan Day Vs Mei Xi Wen (Televised Table)
Mark Selby Vs Stuart Carrington (Televised Table)
12.30pm UK Time:
Ronnie O'Sullivan Vs Michael Holt (Televised Table)
Mark Allen Vs Ding Junhui (Televised Table)
Judd Trump Vs Michael White
John Higgins Vs Ali Carter
An odd decision to put the Mei Xi Wen match on TV despite the obvious home bias. Former winner Bingham will have a tough test from David Gilbert in a match that should be of high quality based on both making two centuries in their first round wins. Carrington showed today he will be no push over for the World Champion Mark Selby. Stephen Maguire will take serious stopping based on his Last 32 and wildcard round showings, so Barry Hawkins will be well up against it there.
Michael Holt beat Ronnie O'Sullivan the last time they met in March's Grand Prix so the former Shanghai champion cannot afford to be rusty as he was in the first round against Liang Wenbo, especially with Holt showing decent form in beating the defending champion Kyren Wilson. Ding Junhui and Mark Allen has all the makings of a close match with their good records in Shanghai, while Allen was particularly impressive in beating the early season's form man Anthony McGill. Judd Trump picked up the pieces well against a sloppy Ben Woollaston, so Michael White will want to be on fine form rather than the sloppy player that has been seen too much over the last year. Finally, John Higgins and Ali Carter will meet for the fourth time in a year, Carter winning the most recent match 5-0 on the way to the World Open title in July. Prior to that Higgins won two in quick succession at the 2015 Champion of Champions followed by the UK Championship just a week or two afterwards.
All Last 16 matches are once again played over the best-of-9 frames.
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