Yuan Sijun was once again a major surprise on the opening day of the Shanghai Masters as he whitewashed Martin Gould for the second time in 2016 in the wildcard round. The first of those 5-0 victories came in the Last 64 of the China Open at the back end of March and was a massive shock to a large majority of people, with Gould having only just won his maiden ranking title at the German Masters the month before and he came into the tournament as the 14th seed. This time around Gould was the 17th seed but there was no let up from Yuan, who only had his 16th birthday in May between these two meetings.
Despite his young age it has been nearly four years since his debut in professional competition as a 12 year old in an Asian Tour event where he lost out 4-0 to Barry Hawkins. A year later he was taking four frames off of Jimmy White in the International Championship wildcard round, but featuring in all of the Asian Tour events and wildcard rounds of Chinese ranking events of the 2013/2014 season he was picking up more valuable experience. Less of Yuan was seen the following season, but it was in 2015/2016 when he started to pick up some attention. First he featured in the 6 Reds tournament, and secured 1 win in the group stage against John Higgins. March's China Open was the scene of his first two victories in professional competition, beating Andrew Higginson in the wildcard round before whitewashing Gould for the first time. Now fresh from a Last 16 appearance in the 6 Reds featuring victories over Mark Williams and a 6-0 defeat of James Wattana in the first knockout round he is clearly still building in confidence and proving a handful.
Today's victory against Gould saw him open up with breaks of 111 and 65, and as more valuable experience he will feature tomorrow on one of the two televised tables against the World Champion Mark Selby. Yuan Sijun is name we will surely hear a lot more of in snookers future.
Elsewhere today Anthony McGill, Michael Holt and Liang Wenbo avoided shock defeats of their own by winning their respective matches. Hu Hao offered a test for Liang ahead of a much bigger one that faces him tomorrow against Ronnie O'Sullivan, while Michael Holt will now play defending champion Kyren Wilson in their third Shanghai Masters meeting. Indian Open champion Anthony McGill will face former Shanghai finalist Mark Allen in the other Last 32 match that will feature in Tuesday's play, while the remaining four wildcard round matches featuring Kurt Maflin, Stuart Carrington, Ryan Day and Stephen Maguire will also take place.
Today's four first round matches saw three deciding frames and two victories for the lower ranked players. Michael White played out a close match with Ricky Walden, despite getting up an early lead of 3-1 courtesy of a pre-interval century break of 113. Following that break Walden made contributions of 53 and a trademark "something out of nothing" 62 that he always seems to pop up with, on the way to levelling the contest at 3-3. White edged ahead again thanks to his second century, but Walden hit back once more with a mis-cue on 98 denying him a century but doing enough to force the deciding frame. The Welshman took the lead early, only for his higher ranked opponent to hit back before a vital error allowed White to leave Walden requiring three snookers. That was nowhere near the end of contest as a comedy of errors followed. First a failed escape left Walden a free ball from which he could clear and win, only to miss the black from said free ball. Another much more elementary miss out of a snooker gave him a second go but after taking two pinks, he missed the final red and that was the last critical mistake that he would have a chance to make, as the only thing left for Ricky Walden is an early flight home.
In the other early session match David Gilbert made a superb comeback from 3-0 and 4-2 down to beat send Marco Fu out in the first round of the Shanghai Masters for the third year in succession. Fu had a century and a further break of 79 on the way to making it 3-0, before Gilbert made centuries either side of the interval to get back in the match at 2-3, Fu edged further clear but had to watch Gilbert clear the colours to take a vital frame seven keeping the Englishman in the hunt. Another frame followed to make it 4-4, but Fu would not score another point as Gilbert made breaks of 47 and 50 in the decider to seal victory.
Later on in the day, John Higgins and Ding Junhui both overturned 3-1 interval deficits to forge their paths into the Last 16. Higgins made a couple of trademark clearances in his victory over Matt Selt who had enough chances to win but saw the opportunity slip through his fingers as four frames in a row that included a century from Higgins made sure it was he that crossed the line a 5-3 winner.
Long time home favourite Ding had his troubles facing the lowest ranked player to make the venue stages in Shanghai in Scott Donaldson. Donaldson saw his 3-1 lead vanish with Ding levelling at 3-3 quickly after the mid-session break. The Scotsman did hit back by taking a close seventh frame to regain his lead at 4-3, Chances came and went in the last couple of frames, with a missed black in the final frame that will haunt him on his long flight home and Ding was able to pick the pieces and make his way into the Last 16 a 5-4 winner.
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