I will attempt to make things even more interactive with graphs to display how the 16 compare in all of the key statistics which will be: frames per 50+ break, average break when 50 or above, close frame win percentage, average frame aggregate (average points scored per frame - average points conceded per frame).
Of course, as this is the first ever staging of the event there are no "past statistics" like I would bring from many other events but we can start with a look at how the head to heads look for the opening round and even possibly beyond.
HEAD TO HEAD:
- Mark Selby and Anthony McGill will meet for the first time in 2016, having played four times in 2015. Selby won three of those with deciding frame wins at the German Masters (which Selby went on to win) and Ruhr Open as well as a simple 6-1 victory at the 2015 International Championship. McGill's solitary victory was when he inflicted the "Crucible Curse" on Selby in the Last 16 of the 2015 World Championship
- Ricky Walden leads the head to head against Mark Allen, despite victory for Allen in their most recent meeting in the Players Championship final in March. Prior to that Walden had wins to boast in the 2014 Champion of Champions, which was the week after he had beaten Allen in the International Championship final also.
- John Higgins and Mark Williams have met a huge amount of times over the years, but not so much in recent times. Higgins did overcome Williams in this season's World Open, while Williams beat Higgins at the 2015 Bulgarian Open. Prior to that though they had not met in a ranking competition since the 2011 World Championship semi-final and the 2010 UK Championship final (both won narrowly by Higgins)
- Surprisingly, Ali Carter and Judd Trump have only had three major meetings in their career (despite playing a huge amount in the Championship League) and Carter leads 2-1 in those meetings with victory in this years Players Championship to add to his famous 2012 World Championship win over Trump. The left hander whitewashed Carter in this year's German Masters to give him his only win over Carter in ranking competition.
- Joe Perry has only beaten Shaun Murphy once in a major tournament, though this was in their most recent match up at the World Open. Murphy's previous wins include a thumping victory at the 2015 World Championship, and two victories of his own on Chinese soil from 2011 and 2012.
- Ding Junhui and Marco Fu will meet in the first round for their first match since 2013. Ding was the winner on that occasion on the European Tour a short time after he had also beaten Fu in the International Championship final 10-9. Outside of a European tour win from 2013 of his own, Fu has not beaten Ding in a major tournament since the 2008 Masters.
- Neil Robertson and Michael Holt will meet in round one for their third meeting in 2016. Holt overcame Robertson 10-6 in the first round of the World Championships, before Robertson took his revenge with victory in the Riga Masters in June. Holt's only other victory against Robertson however, came in the 2000 China Open with Robertson winning a further six times against Holt.
- Finally from the first round head to heads, Liang Wenbo has a winning record against Stuart Bingham having beaten him in their last three major meetings (and last four if you count the Championship League). That includes their recent English Open semi-final as well as the 2015 German Masters and 2015 Riga Open. Both of Bingham's wins were in China though, with an Asian Tour final win in 2014, and victory at the 2013 China Open.
- There are a lot of if's, but's and maybe's in terms of Quarter-final match-up's but if Higgins and Trump both win their first round games it would set up their fourth meeting of the season, with Trump winning the previous three at the Riga Masters, European Masters and English Open.
- All possible outcomes in the Murphy/Perry Vs Ding/Fu section are quite interesting. If Murphy wins he has beaten Ding in their last three meetings (2016 Grand Prix, 2014 World Open and 2014 Masters) but lost his last three against Fu (2014 and 2015 UK Championships and 2014 Champion of Champions). As for Perry he has beaten Ding in their last two meetings (2015 Masters and 2015 Players Championship) despite having an otherwise poor record against the Chinese, yet he has lost his last two meetings with Marco Fu (2013 International Championship and 2012 Australian Open) and only ever beaten Fu once.
PLAYER PERFORMANCE - KEY INDICATORS:
Frames per 50+ break:
The graph and table below demonstrates how relatively close all of the average frames per 50+ break statistics are between these top players, and the reason I have put these all in this week is to make it more interactive and show any big gaps between players.
Neil Robertson unsurprisingly leads the way here with Mark Allen just behind him in second. Then there is a small gap before Ding Junhui and Judd Trump sit in joint third and things get quite close between them two, McGill, Fu and Selby. The next biggest comes halfway down the 16 man table for this week between Liang and Shaun Murphy who is in joint ninth with Ricky Walden and that may be caused by a little gap in the form of some of these top players this season so far (as these stats have been measured since the start of the season). There is then a reasonable gap before Joe Perry who has not been in the best of form, while Stuart Bingham is a little lower than some of his finishes would suggest. Higgins is also lower than I would have thought someone who has had four quarter-finals in six events would be, while Williams has been very poor. Ali Carter is bottom of the list despite having won an event, which just demonstrates that frequency of big breaks is not the strength of his game and he is more reliant on the tactical side of the game.
Average break when 50 or above:
Having dealt with frequency of scoring the next step is to look at weight of scoring, with the average break when a player makes any break of 50 or above. Marco Fu leads the way and this for me sums up the fact that while his results have not been great, he has not necessarily been losing matches by a long way or because he has not made enough big breaks, so losing close frames at crucial points of tight matches could be all that has gone wrong for Fu. Next up are tournament winners in recent times with Liang and Trump and with the heavy scorers that they are, you would expect them to be near the top of this chart when they are in form. Joe Perry is perhaps in a similar boat to Fu, though his frequency of breaks was not as good as Fu's. Higgins and Bingham sit well after their consistent starts to the season, having reached the latter stages a lot without getting a trophy to take home.
There is not a great deal in the middle of this table between top players, and even Allen's low score near the bottom does not matter when you consider how high up he was for frequency of big breaks. Ali Carter's lack of heavy scoring is somewhat reflected again here as a lower "break weight" average would suggest a lower amount of centuries. This is the same for the likes of Walden and Murphy who have not had as many deep runs into tournaments this year, while Mark Williams poor form is reflected in his bottom of the table finish and lack of really big breaks through the season to go with his low "break frequency" finish.
Close frames Win percentage:
Next up are those all important tactical frames in the close frames win percentage statistics. Close frames I determined as frames where there are 20 points are less between the scores and with that in mind it is no surprise to see an in form Mark Selby at the top of this list. When he is winning tournaments he is always going to be in the top three on this list with all the other top players, such is how good he is at grinding down the top players as well as those that are lower down in the rankings. The in form Liang Wenbo is also very close behind Selby, before a fair gap finds Neil Robertson who has also had a tournament win this season, in third position. There is another little gap before two more tactical titans in Higgins and Carter complete the top five and it is certainly no surprise to see them there.
The percentages in the middle of the list for this week field are understandably close, but there is a gap before the guys at the bottom like Ricky Walden and Shaun Murphy who are once again in the wrong half of these standings (just like in the big break stats) and this again displays perhaps why they have not had so many big runs. It is surprising however to find two such hot players from the season so far with Ding and Trump propping up the close frame standings. Both have won a tournament and been a runner-up in one more, but with very good scoring statistics this may just show where their strengths and weaknesses lie or that they have been slightly unlucky in closer frames.
Average frame aggregate:
Finally, there is the overall frame aggregates statistic which is the average points scored per frame minus average points conceded per frame. It is no surprise to see someone in the form that Trump is at the top of the table, with Robertson and McGill (both tournament winners in the early season) just behind. Selby is in fourth after a big climb in the rankings following convincing victories in the latter stages of his International Championship win. Mark Allen and Shaun Murphy have had a number of convincing wins in the early rounds of a few tournaments this year which is why they are higher up this league. As for Ding he was a lot higher in this standing until a 10-1 final loss in Daqing saw him drop a few places.
There is a little bit of a gap down to the bottom then where players that have not reached the latter stages of tournaments as much are found. Joe Perry has lost his first match in four tournaments this year, which will have heavily hindered his aggregate, while Carter has been involved in a number of close frames in his matches. Marco Fu's early exits see him lower on the aggregate, along with Ricky Walden and Mark Williams who have not had many deep runs in tournaments. Michael Holt has had a couple of good tournaments making the quarter-finals but he suffered heavy defeats (in terms of points) to Xiao Guodong in the English Open and John Higgins in the European Masters demonstrating again how one match can slide you down the list a long way.
TOURNAMENT TOP TEN:
With a field of just 16 for this weeks China Championship I thought it would be fun to rank all 16 members rather than picking out the usual "Tournament Top Ten". The key indicators that went into this week were the recent events at the International Championship, English Open, European Masters and Shanghai Masters as well as the World Open as the other Chinese event from the season so far. Along with that the stats shown above were also put into the "generator" and with this being the first China Championship I felt the most similar event to this was the International Championship so the 2014 and 2015 versions of that were added to this years finishes from Daqing.
16- Michael Holt - Holt has had a couple of quarter-finals at the Shanghai Masters and International Championship, and if the Riga Masters would have been taken into account he would have been much higher on the list, despite not featuring in the top five on any stats lists.
15- Mark Williams - This placing for Mark Williams sums up a very poor season so far for Williams with just a couple of Last 16's in the events that counted towards this weeks "Top Ten" list and not featuring in the top five on any of the above statistics.
14- Marco Fu - Fu may feature as the number one player on the average break when 50 or above list but his results on the whole have been poor and he finds himself low down on the list for that reason.
13- Shaun Murphy - Murphy too is low, featuring in the top five in none of the four above statistics and only having a couple of quarter-finals in the International Championship and World Open out of the events that were viewed as important for this list.
12- Joe Perry - Perry started the season well by making the World Open final and is a little further ahead of the bottom four on this list. Otherwise, a series of early exits in between then and an International quarter-final see him lower down the list than you would perhaps expect.
11- Anthony McGill - McGill may have been an early season winner in India but that did not count towards this weeks list. Aside from that, he has had quarter-finals at the World Open and European Masters as well as coming in 3rd for the season so far on the average frame aggregates and fifth on frames per 50+ break stat.
10- Ricky Walden - Walden finds himself in the top ten (where there is a fair gap between 10 and 11) mainly thanks to his place as a former International Champion which seems relevant in a week with a very similar format. On top of that he has had a couple of recent last 16's in the European Masters and last weeks International Championship with a quarter-final appearance at the English Open sandwiched between.
9- Mark Allen - Allen was the runner-up in the year Walden was International champion, though did not qualify this year and was the only man out of the 16 involved this week who was not present in Daqing. He has had Last 16's in the European and Shanghai Masters and despite not yet really going deep into a tournament, Allen is fifth on the average frame aggregates list and second on the average frames per 50+ break list.
8- Stuart Bingham - Bingham has started to fire in recent weeks with three semi-finals in the last four events played (Shanghai Masters, English Open and International Championship). As well as that he is fifth on the average contribution when above 50 statistic. The fact he has not quite made a final is the main reason he is not within the top five on this weeks list.
7- Neil Robertson - Robertson has had a couple of semi-finals of his own that count towards this weeks rankings at the European Masters and World Open but it is statistically where he gains most of his ranking. First for frames per 50+ break, second for average frame aggregate and third in close frames win percentage display a good all round game for Robertson who too would be very high on this list if his win at the Riga Masters in June would be more relevant for this week.
6- Ali Carter - Into the tournament winners now, and the first of those on the list is July's World Open winner Ali Carter. On top of that win was a strong quarter-final at the Shanghai Masters and he is also boosted on this list by a fifth place standing on the close frames win percentage list.
5- Liang Wenbo - Liang Wenbo was a much more recent winner at the English Open and added to that Last 16's in the tournaments either side of that victory. Statistically he is fairly strong with second place finishes on the close frames win percentage and average contribution when above 50 lists, and with such a high standing on this weeks list he has to be classed as a contender.
4- Ding Junhui - There is a fairly big gap between fourth placed Ding Junhui and fifth placed Liang, mainly thanks to the fact that Ding featured in last weeks International Championship final and was a winner in September's Shanghai Masters. Statistically his best effort is a joint third place showing on the frames per 50+ break leaderboard of the players involved this week. The form certainly points to Ding being a strong contender this week.
3- John Higgins - Higgins may not have won this season as yet, but a win at the 2015 International being relevant to this week with the similar formats certainly makes Higgins noteworthy coming into the week. On top of that he has had a consistent season on the whole making quarter-finals in the World Open, English Open, International Championship and European Masters which all count towards this weeks list. Along with fourth place standings on the close frame win percentage and average contribution when 50 or above lists and Higgins is worthy of his podium place on the China Championship pre-tournament list.
2- Judd Trump - Judd Trump has been one of the season's form men so far and is very close to finishing top of the list here. A winner at the European Masters he followed that straight up by making the English Open final and International semi's. Statistically he is top of the average frame aggregates list above and third in both the average frames per 50+ break and on the average break when he makes one of those breaks of 50 or above.
1- Mark Selby - Yet, the man that tops this weeks list is the most recent winner on tour and the world champion, Mark Selby. Winning the International Championship is the highlight in a brilliant season so far that has also included a final appearance at the Shanghai Masters and making the last four in Romania as well as the last four of last years International Championship which is noteworthy to this weeks event. Statistically he leads the field for this week in the close frame win percentage list and is fourth when it comes to average frame aggregates. His levels of consistency through the most recent months make him a huge contender again for this weeks China Championship.
That concludes the statistical portion of analysis ahead of the China Championship which commences on Tuesday, but there will still be my full preview to look out for, where opinion will be added to facts and figures and then we will see how closely the events run to the numbers and predictions.
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