Ken Doherty kept his brilliant run going this season by qualifying for the European Masters, beating Barry Hawkins 4-3 for the privilege. Doherty produced a well controlled 69 in the decider to get over the line and add to his win over Ali Carter in the Indian Open qualifiers on Tuesday, keeping the Irishman on cloud nine.
Jimmy Robertson fell 4-3 to Sam Baird despite a break of 130 in a match that looked to have a lot of high quality throughout. Adam Duffy produced a 4-2 win over Liam Highfield to make it two out of two for him this week in the qualifiers, having beaten Noppon Saengkham earlier in the week, who he will play again in the World Open qualifiers for their third meeting of the season already.
Chen Zifan meanwhile won his third qualifier out of four this season as he saw off Hammad Miah 4-2. In the afternoon session, Yuan Sijun secured his first win as a tour professional, the 17-year-old beating Allan Taylor 4-2 in a match that did not necessarily have the highest quality, but did again show flashes of the talent with Yuan that can certainly be honed.
Ben Woollaston looked in much better form yesterday in a 4-0 win against Ian Burns than he had earlier in the week. Whenever I glanced over to that table he seemed to be in and scoring, and sealed victory in little over an hour, finishing with a century break that accompanied to other 60+ breaks in the match. Kyren Wilson was able to put the disappointment of Wednesday afternoon's defeat behind him as he took care of Xu Si 4-0.
Gerard Greene managed to grab a 4-3 victory Andrew Higginson in a ding dong battle where Gerard was on top for much of the play but could not shake off his opponent. After winning the first two frames, with Higginson missing a few chances, he was then able to claw his way back in and steal the next two despite decent breaks from Greene in each. The Northern Irishman edged back in front in a fifth frame that Higginson again had chances, but a magnificent century from Higginson forced the decider. It was the higher ranked player who had the first chance in the decider but missing in the thirties and leaving the red over the hole handed that over to Greene. His first move was to go into the pack from the red over the corner and having split the reds he did not back. A run of 76 was more than enough to secure a deserved win.
My first feature match of the afternoon saw Robin Hull defeated 4-2 by Zhang Yong. The Finn had started well with an excellent 99 to settle into the match immediately, and he looked to be cueing very nicely early on. This was backed up by a good 63 to quickly double his lead, and at this stage you thought that the match would be over very quickly. The turning point came in frame three which Zhang Yong won on the pink and that gave him a huge boost of confidence, as would the support of some of his fellow Chinese players in the crowd. A run of 90 in the fourth not only squared the match up but showed how well Zhang was cueing as he continued to pull out shot after shot. He did not waste his opportunity in frame five either with 68 to edge ahead for the first time, and by now Hull was left to wonder how this had come about after a great start. When Zhang completed victory Hull will have been left very disappointed and frustrated not to have converted a good start into a Belgium trip, but Zhang played very well from the third frame onwards and looked a lot more comfortable.
Later in the afternoon I was treated to another great battle as Gary Wilson took on Hossein Vafei. Both players were in top scoring form, with Wilson looking very comfortable and confident as he took the opening frame, despite needing two chances. Hossein needed two chances to take the second but a run of 50 from the second chance squared up the affair and at this stage they were playing at a great speed. 82 from Wilson put his nose back in front before Hossein made a brilliant 93 to level with both players going blow for blow and answering the others great play. Hossein then took the lead in frame five but let Wilson back in with a chance to steal and even though he let that one slip by, another came to his cue pretty quickly but a was left this time to rue a missed yellow and Hossein would have been relieved to pot the colours he needed for the frame.
Hossein built a 50 point lead again in the sixth frame and it looked like it could be curtains for Wilson, but when the Iranian missed a tough one, Wilson cleared down to the final red before playing safe with his hat firmly back in the ring. In the end a snooker behind the black forced the critical mistake and Wilson did the rest to take the match to a deserved deciding frame. The decider deserves a blog of its own in many ways to cover all of the drama. Wilson had the first chance and built a strong lead of 55 but lost position shortly after opening the pack, and this let Hossein back in to claw back the deficit. A run of 50 down to the yellow was good to get back into the frame but a critical miss was not. Wilson got the upper hand back by potting the yellow and playing a clever snooker on the green. This got him eight foul points and a ball in hand from which he potted the green from range. Brown would have been match ball but Hossein won the safety battle on that but could not get on the blue. More safety was played and Hossein again won the battle and followed with a decent pink, but left the black at long range, but still produced a top pot to win the match, much to his delight and that of fellow countryman Soheil Vahedi who was watching on. Meanwhile, Wilson wondered what might have been and let the table feel some of his frustration on the way out of the arena.
Elsewhere, there was victory for Mark Allen in a tough game with Daniel Wells, though Allen produced a nice clearance in the third frame, and made a 91 in the sixth before signing for a 4-2 win. Peter Ebdon clung on for a deciding frame win against the unorthodox Akani Songsermsawad who certainly has a unique style that I've never seen the like of before.
In the evening session there was a good victory for Noppon Saengkham who continues to improve, progress and look like a dangerous player every time I see him. A 130 break along the way was testament to that. Michael Holt eased to a 4-0 victory against Paul Davison, who made Holt work hard in a couple of frames but could not really string anything together.
Match of the evening saw Billy Castle get his first win as a professional by beating Jimmy White 4-3. It was a close affair all the way through with a number of frames coming down to the colours, with a critical moment coming in frame four when Castle needed snookers to avoid going 3-1 down, but played a brilliant snooker on the pink and ended up squaring the match at 2-2. White went back in front, but Castle stayed with him making a gritty 56 to force the deciding frame. After chances for both players, Castle was left in with all the reds open and in the middle of the table almost how you would set them up in practice. However, there was much more pressure than that but Castle was equal to it securing a brilliant win against a frustrated Whirlwind.
Today is the final day of European Masters qualifying, with World Open qualifying then starting on Sunday, while I depart from Preston tomorrow. Before that I may have a live blog or two from the afternoon session so once again, keep on the look out for that.
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