Marks Selby and Allen cruise into International final

Mark Selby and Mark Allen will contest the International Championship final after comfortable victories in the last four.

Selby was the first man through in his two session semi-final against Martin Gould. Gould started well with a run of 53 to take the opener, but that was really as good as things would get for him in the opening session. Selby took the next two to move in front, and then made consecutive centuries of 119 and 127 to really start dominating and lead 4-1. Gould had chances in the sixth but once Selby took that too, he was guaranteed a first session lead, 5-1 ahead with two to play.

The world number one kept his foot on the gas though, contributing 59 in the seventh and a 72 break in the final frame of the afternoon to put himself 7-1 up and coming back in the evening requiring just two frames for victory. He carried on from where he'd left off once the second session came around, as a break of 97 made it 8-1. Gould then set about make the score slightly more respectable, taking the tenth in one visit with a 95 making it 2-8 and then taking the eleventh on the black. A run of 56 in the twelfth meant that the inevitable was delayed no more for Selby and confirmed his place in the International final for a second successive year with this emphatic 9-3 win.


Mark Allen meanwhile had the tough task of taming the beast that is Yan Bingtao in Saturday's semi-final. Unlike Yan's wins with Ronnie O'Sullivan and John Higgins in rounds previous, his performance in the first four frames of his maiden semi-final were a little nervy. All four went to Allen as he surged to a 4-0 mid-session interval lead, aided by runs of 55, 64 and 70 in the process. The 17-year-old began to find his game after the short break, settling himself down with runs of 73 and 98 to close the gap to 2-4.

With his opponent threatening to come back into the game, Allen really put his foot on the gas in the final two frames of the afternoon session, making two faultless breaks of 105 and 102 to take the last two frames and take a 6-2 lead into the evening. A run of 50 in the first session of the night made Yan's task a near impossible one as the Northern Irishman surged 7-2 ahead, and from there it did not take him long to complete the job. A break of 90 gave him frame ten and a 72 in the eleventh secured a monumental 9-2 victory, putting him in his first ranking final since winning the 2016 Players Championship, and his fifth ranking final in China overall.


The Final: (Best-of-19 frames) 

Mark Selby Vs Mark Allen - 

The head-to-head between Selby and Allen provides plenty of evidence that this could be a final that goes right down to the wire. In eight meetings outside of the Championship League, Allen has won five overall and each of the last three, as well as winning all three of their games in China. Seven of those eight meetings mentioned have gone down to a final frame decider, the 2012 Antwerp Open final (won 4-1 by Allen) proving the exception to the rule.

Selby may be the defending champion, but Allen has also been in the final of this event before, losing out in 2014 to Ricky Walden. It was at around this time last year when he found form, making the semi-finals of both the China Championship and the Champion of Champions beating Selby in the finals of both events. It may be a coincidence that Allen has played well at this time of the year in 2013 (winning back to back European Tour events), 2014 (making the Shanghai Masters and International Championship finals) and 2016 (making back to back big invitational semi-finals) but he has been in great form leading up to this point and is someone I pointed to at the start of the week as a "clear contender".

Selby though is so tough to beat in the longer format, especially once he has got his eye in - which he seems to have done in the last couple of rounds. After storming through the semi-finals last year he then thrashed Ding Junhui in the final, and even though his opponent here is in form, you cannot completely rule out the possibility of the same happening to complete a magnificent defence. The fact that this is his first final of the season means very little, it is not as if there have been huge amounts of opportunities for him as yet given the events he has actually played in. Once again he appears to have found his form at the perfect time, with a couple of big money tournaments coming in the next fortnight before then heading back to York for his UK Championship defence.

Overall, if you take into account the head to head and the fact that all of those games were pretty big matches it is a tough game to call and if this final lives up to those past encounters, it could well go right to the wire once more.