This is the third home nations event of the season and the final trophy up for grabs in 2018, so it's glory's last shot for a lot of players who have under-performed in 2018. Two notable absentees from Glasgow though are world number one Mark Selby, who lost in the last 128 of the UK Championships, and world champion Mark Williams who have decided to take a bit of extra time off before Christmas.
In attendance though is last year's champion Neil Robertson who overcame Cao Yupeng in one of the most dramatic finals of the 2017/2018 season. However, as we all know by now the runner-up Cao was suspended at the start of the season and has since been banned until November 2020.
Marco Fu is the other former winner of this event since it was brought back as part of the Home Nations Series, as he upset the home fans by defeating John Higgins in the final back in 2016.
Higgins joins a cluster of home hopefuls hoping to bring glory to Scotland with Stephen Maguire the next highest ranked Scotsman. Anthony McGill will be hoping his home event inspires a turnaround in form, while 2006 world champion Graeme Dott will also be gunning for glory. Other Scots include Scott Donaldson, Alan McManus, Chris Totten, Ross Muir, Rhys Clark and amateur invites Fraser Patrick and Craig MacGillivray.
Quarter 1
Last 128 draw: (Picks in bold)
Neil Robertson Vs Peter Lines
Alexander Ursenbacher Vs Ross Muir
Chris Wakelin Vs Martin O'Donnell
Rod Lawler Vs Sam Baird
Ali Carter Vs Luo Honghao
Michael Georgiou Vs Sean O'Sullivan
Mark King Vs Mei Xiwen
Tom Ford Vs David Lilley
Joe Perry Vs James Wattana
Liam Highfield Vs Robbie Williams
Li Hang Vs Paul Davison
Kyren Wilson Vs Oliver Lines
Nigel Bond Vs Andy Lee
Michael White Vs Allan Taylor
Michael Holt Vs Sam Craigie
Shaun Murphy Vs Akani Songsermsawad
Shaun Murphy continued his struggles this season with a last 128 exit at the UK Championships 6-3 to Chen Feilong having been 3-1 up. Now he comes to the Home Nations series events where success has been hard to come by. In 10 previous events since the series was set up he has only reached the last 16 once. Last year here he lost in the first round to Daniel Wells and this year I see the same outcome coming as he faces a tough opponent in Akani Songsermsawad. In many ways, Akani is the benchmark for where Murphy needs to get in the next two events. The Thai sits 32nd on the World Grand Prix rankings, and is some £22,000 ahead of 65th placed Murphy who realistically needs to make at least the semi-finals in either this event or the German Masters and not lose before the last 16 in the other to qualify for the Grand Prix, a title the Magician won in 2016. Perhaps spending the week in York commentating rather than playing will give him a fresh perspective or coming off of Twitter will help block out the negative noise. At the moment though, there are not too many positive signs coming from Murphy's season to hint at a possible turnaround.
Kyren Wilson meanwhile is a real contender for every tournament he enters. After cruising to the quarter-finals of the UK Championship he came up short against Stuart Bingham who scored well against him. It was always likely to take a good performance to beat Wilson in York and it will need the same again in Glasgow if he gets himself himself straight back up for the task. That was not something he did at the Northern Ireland Open, but he had less than 24 hours to recover from a gutting 10-9 defeat against Ronnie O'Sullivan in the Champion of Champions before facing Lee Walker in Belfast. Other than a couple of minor blemishes here and there it has been a great season for Wilson and he is certainly at the forefront of my mind when looking at quarter and tournament winners.
Joe Perry is a player who may be getting back to that sort of form. The final he reached at the European Masters helped put him back close to the top table and he is 11th on this season's money list after reaching the quarter-finals of the UK Championship. Until a slightly surprise quarter-final loss to Tom Ford, he was excellent in York defeating Judd Trump in the last 16 and cruising to that stage with three easy wins in the early rounds. His immediate rival in this section would be Wilson who he could face in the last 32, though Perry overcame him on the way to that final in Lommel a couple of months ago, so there's no reason why he could not repeat that again. Should he continue his York form from the first four rounds then he is a big contender to win this opening quarter of the draw.
Neil Robertson is my first quarter choice and the defending champion looks to be playing better at the moment than he was when he won this title last December. The title win came in the one week he was outside of the top 16, seeing him out of the Masters in January. This year though he is firmly back in the top 16 having also won the Riga Masters and made it to the International Championship final, which has him in fourth position on the money list this season. His last 16 defeat to Mark Allen at the UK Championship came after Allen finished with back-to-back tons to win 6-5. There are certainly some players that could offer danger on their day to Robertson in this section, but if he starts matches better than he did in the early part of the UK Championship and at the Northern Ireland Open then it is hard to see him losing prior to the quarter-finals. His scoring is so good that it is hard to see why he went through tough patches in his game but once again he is back to being a tournament contender and he has a good chance of putting in a strong title defence this week.
Kyren Wilson meanwhile is a real contender for every tournament he enters. After cruising to the quarter-finals of the UK Championship he came up short against Stuart Bingham who scored well against him. It was always likely to take a good performance to beat Wilson in York and it will need the same again in Glasgow if he gets himself himself straight back up for the task. That was not something he did at the Northern Ireland Open, but he had less than 24 hours to recover from a gutting 10-9 defeat against Ronnie O'Sullivan in the Champion of Champions before facing Lee Walker in Belfast. Other than a couple of minor blemishes here and there it has been a great season for Wilson and he is certainly at the forefront of my mind when looking at quarter and tournament winners.
Joe Perry is a player who may be getting back to that sort of form. The final he reached at the European Masters helped put him back close to the top table and he is 11th on this season's money list after reaching the quarter-finals of the UK Championship. Until a slightly surprise quarter-final loss to Tom Ford, he was excellent in York defeating Judd Trump in the last 16 and cruising to that stage with three easy wins in the early rounds. His immediate rival in this section would be Wilson who he could face in the last 32, though Perry overcame him on the way to that final in Lommel a couple of months ago, so there's no reason why he could not repeat that again. Should he continue his York form from the first four rounds then he is a big contender to win this opening quarter of the draw.
Neil Robertson is my first quarter choice and the defending champion looks to be playing better at the moment than he was when he won this title last December. The title win came in the one week he was outside of the top 16, seeing him out of the Masters in January. This year though he is firmly back in the top 16 having also won the Riga Masters and made it to the International Championship final, which has him in fourth position on the money list this season. His last 16 defeat to Mark Allen at the UK Championship came after Allen finished with back-to-back tons to win 6-5. There are certainly some players that could offer danger on their day to Robertson in this section, but if he starts matches better than he did in the early part of the UK Championship and at the Northern Ireland Open then it is hard to see him losing prior to the quarter-finals. His scoring is so good that it is hard to see why he went through tough patches in his game but once again he is back to being a tournament contender and he has a good chance of putting in a strong title defence this week.
Best of the rest: Joe Perry
Quarter choice: Neil Robertson
Quarter 2
Last 128 draw: (Picks in bold)
Barry Hawkins Vs Zhou Yuelong
Lu Haotian Vs Fan Zhengyi
Gary Wilson Vs Stuart Carrington
Hossein Vafei Vs Eden Sharav
Stuart Bingham Vs Tian Pengfei
Robin Hull Vs Kishan Hirani
Duane Jones Vs Lu Ning
Jak Jones Vs Sanderson Lam
Matthew Selt Vs Ian Burns
Mike Dunn Vs Joe O'Connor
Hamza Akbar Vs Soheil Vahedi
Stephen Maguire Vs Billy Castle
Zhang Jiankang Vs Simon Lichtenberg
Lee Walker Vs Jordan Brown
Ben Woollaston Vs Harvey Chandler
Judd Trump Vs Jimmy White
Stuart Bingham is one of the headliners of this second quarter. Bingham won the first home nations event of the season by defeating Mark Davis to win the English Open but the lofty million pound dreams were ended abruptly when he was defeated by Peter Lines in the last 128 in Belfast. Much more gut-wrenching though will be his 6-5 UK semi-final loss to Mark Allen and he does not have long to get over that one before facing a tough task against Tian Pengfei in Glasgow. Tian is well capable of pulling off an upset here having previously defeated Judd Trump in the European Masters to make the quarter-finals and he also defeated Lu Haotian and Jimmy Robertson to reach the last 32 in York, so by no means if this an easy draw for Bingham. Get through it though and you have to fancy him for another big run here in Glasgow looking at the draw.
Judd Trump will be disappointed with how he exited the UK Championship. The recent Northern Ireland Open champion stated that he needs to win more big events and was once again looking good in the early rounds but a last 16 defeat in a close match against Joe Perry will have left him feeling a bit low you would imagine and he may find it difficult to get his mind straight back on the job in Glasgow. At this event he is back-to-back semi-finalist but even that will be a bit disappointing looking back as he threw away a big lead against Higgins in 2016 and lost to Cao Yupeng in 2017 in a match Trump was a huge favourite for.
Barry Hawkins has gone a bit quiet in recent times but is still a major contender for this title. His run in York was halted by a good performance from Kyren Wilson but prior to that he had failed to get beyond the last 32 in each of the Northern Ireland Open, International Championship, English Open and the European Masters after a promising period at the end of last season carried over into the start of this campaign. The draw here in Glasgow is a tricky one also as he faces Zhou Yuelong in the very first round and Zhou could certainly do some damage over the best-of-7 frames, having reached the last 16 of both the English Open and Northern Ireland Open in recent times.
Stephen Maguire is the player I have earmarked to be the leading Scotsman this week in Glasgow and is also my pick for the second quarter of the draw. He is back in the top 16 for this season's Masters and it would be great for him and his fans if he won his first ranking title for five and a half years in his home tournament. His UK quarter-final against Mark Allen he put down to the state of the table as he lost 6-1 after superbly coming from 4-0 down to defeat Mark Williams the round before, as well as defeating Ali Carter in the last 32. In the first home nations event of the season he made the semi-finals before losing to eventual champion Bingham, and in Belfast he lost out after a tough first round draw put him up against Michael Holt. It seems to me as though Maguire is fighting hard to get back to where he was in 2013 when he last won a ranking title as he has certainly not achieved as much as he could have in recent years given his talent. Trump is really the only player in his half of this quarter that you could see beating Maguire, but if he could beat Trump or if Trump were to lose early on then I think Maguire could be set for a really big run here in Glasgow.
Judd Trump will be disappointed with how he exited the UK Championship. The recent Northern Ireland Open champion stated that he needs to win more big events and was once again looking good in the early rounds but a last 16 defeat in a close match against Joe Perry will have left him feeling a bit low you would imagine and he may find it difficult to get his mind straight back on the job in Glasgow. At this event he is back-to-back semi-finalist but even that will be a bit disappointing looking back as he threw away a big lead against Higgins in 2016 and lost to Cao Yupeng in 2017 in a match Trump was a huge favourite for.
Barry Hawkins has gone a bit quiet in recent times but is still a major contender for this title. His run in York was halted by a good performance from Kyren Wilson but prior to that he had failed to get beyond the last 32 in each of the Northern Ireland Open, International Championship, English Open and the European Masters after a promising period at the end of last season carried over into the start of this campaign. The draw here in Glasgow is a tricky one also as he faces Zhou Yuelong in the very first round and Zhou could certainly do some damage over the best-of-7 frames, having reached the last 16 of both the English Open and Northern Ireland Open in recent times.
Stephen Maguire is the player I have earmarked to be the leading Scotsman this week in Glasgow and is also my pick for the second quarter of the draw. He is back in the top 16 for this season's Masters and it would be great for him and his fans if he won his first ranking title for five and a half years in his home tournament. His UK quarter-final against Mark Allen he put down to the state of the table as he lost 6-1 after superbly coming from 4-0 down to defeat Mark Williams the round before, as well as defeating Ali Carter in the last 32. In the first home nations event of the season he made the semi-finals before losing to eventual champion Bingham, and in Belfast he lost out after a tough first round draw put him up against Michael Holt. It seems to me as though Maguire is fighting hard to get back to where he was in 2013 when he last won a ranking title as he has certainly not achieved as much as he could have in recent years given his talent. Trump is really the only player in his half of this quarter that you could see beating Maguire, but if he could beat Trump or if Trump were to lose early on then I think Maguire could be set for a really big run here in Glasgow.
Best of the rest: Stuart Bingham
Quarter choice: Stephen Maguire
Quarter 3
Last 128 draw: (Picks in bold)
John Higgins Vs Adam Duffy
Gerard Greene Vs Chris Totten
Craig Steadman Vs Ashley Carty
Yan Bingtao Vs Basem Eltahhan
Marco Fu Vs Chen Zifan
Peter Ebdon Vs Alfie Burden
Thor Chuan Leong Vs James Cahill
Anthony McGill Vs Zhang Yong
Scott Donaldson Vs Rory McLeod
Graeme Dott Vs Xu Si
Alan McManus Vs John Astley
Luca Brecel Vs Hammad Miah
Dechawat Poomjaeng Vs Luke Simmonds
Xiao Guodong Vs Yuan Sijun
Chen Feilong Vs Fraser Patrick
Mark Allen Vs Liang Wenbo
John Higgins is the Scottish number one and will be hoping he can go one or two better than he has in the last couple of years in his home event. In 2016 he was blown away in the second half of his final with Marco Fu, while a year later he lost out in the semi-finals against Neil Robertson and would obviously have been a huge favourite to beat Cao Yupeng had he gotten through. This season is getting gloomy though for Higgins after last 128 exits at the International Championship and Northern Ireland Open have been followed by a last 64 exit at the UK Championship and he is now threatening to retire. I summarised this in a social media conversation by stating how difficult it must be for a player to get over losing a tight world championship final. For Higgins to have lost two really close Crucible finals in two years, it is going to take an incredible amount of mental strength to look beyond that to future success, especially at the stage he is at in his career - where he feels opportunities to win the sport's biggest prize are starting to look numbered. Will his home tournament this week inspire a turn in fortunes? Perhaps. Does he potentially need to take a few weeks off, skip some tournaments and get away from the practice table until he feels the motivation to return? This may be a more likely solution, because having reached back-to-back world finals, it is far too early for him to retire.
Mark Allen is a man at the opposite end of things in terms of confidence, belief and overall happiness having just backed up his International Championship victory by making the final of the UK Championship. Allen is the leader on the one-season money list (regardless of the result in the York finale which is ongoing at the time of writing) and is right up there with O'Sullivan as the two best players this season. He has really stepped up a gear this season to challenge for more titles, having gotten his hands on the Masters title in January. As for this week in Scotland, the big question is whether he will be able to get himself back in playing mode after the UK final, whatever the result. His first round opponent is Liang Wenbo who may be out of form at the moment having lost from 5-1 up in the first round of the UK Championship, but he still presents a tough match on paper for Allen, especially if Allen runs out of steam after his exploits of the last five weeks or so.
Graeme Dott, Alan McManus, Anthony McGill and Scott Donaldson are four of the other leading Scottish players in a home favourite heavy section besides the obvious stand out Higgins. Dott was unlucky in York not to defeat Neil Robertson in the last 32 so he looks to be improving after a quiet start to the season. McManus was the man to beat Higgins in the last 64 of the UK Championship and that result gave a timely boost to McManus' end-of-season ranking where he is now provisionally 57th and nicely clear of danger. McGill is in danger of having a very quiet season if he does not soon get things going. His failure to see off Lu Ning from 5-2 ahead in the last 128 of the UK Championships added to a string of disappointments in the first half of this season that have left him languishing at 68th on the World Grand Prix list and he needs similar heroics to Shaun Murphy in this event and the German Masters if he is to be in Cheltenham in February.
In a mini section of the draw that contains McManus, Dott and Luca Brecel, who needs to make the quarter-finals here to avoid going through the entire of 2018 without a ranking event quarter-final appearance, Scott Donaldson could be the man to come through and make the last 16. He was unlucky to lose 6-4 to fellow Scot Stephen Maguire at the last 64 stage of the UK Championship, but he does actually outrank McGill, Dott and McManus on the one-year list and at 62nd on the provisional end-of-season list he could do with the victories here to put a bit more security.
Marco Fu was the winner here two years ago and he has an excellent record in Scotland over the course of his career. He may not be the same player that he was two years ago since eye troubles have plagued him and halted his progress as he looked to be playing some of his best ever snooker. When he won this title he scored as well as anyone could dream of scoring and having won the Gibraltar Open on the same week in December a year earlier it seems that there is something about this time of year that really gets him playing well. Perhaps his family really go big with their Christmas lists. The season has offered little in the way promise, though he has suffered two last 32 exits to Jack Lisowski which have proved decisive in him falling out of the top 16 for the Masters, just as Robertson did 12 months ago. His last 128 exit at the Northern Irish open to Chen Feilong was a huge shock until Chen then toppled Murphy at the UK Championship, but his comfortable victories in the first two rounds of the UK Championship did offer some hope of a revival and that could start here on a happy hunting ground.
Mark Allen is a man at the opposite end of things in terms of confidence, belief and overall happiness having just backed up his International Championship victory by making the final of the UK Championship. Allen is the leader on the one-season money list (regardless of the result in the York finale which is ongoing at the time of writing) and is right up there with O'Sullivan as the two best players this season. He has really stepped up a gear this season to challenge for more titles, having gotten his hands on the Masters title in January. As for this week in Scotland, the big question is whether he will be able to get himself back in playing mode after the UK final, whatever the result. His first round opponent is Liang Wenbo who may be out of form at the moment having lost from 5-1 up in the first round of the UK Championship, but he still presents a tough match on paper for Allen, especially if Allen runs out of steam after his exploits of the last five weeks or so.
Graeme Dott, Alan McManus, Anthony McGill and Scott Donaldson are four of the other leading Scottish players in a home favourite heavy section besides the obvious stand out Higgins. Dott was unlucky in York not to defeat Neil Robertson in the last 32 so he looks to be improving after a quiet start to the season. McManus was the man to beat Higgins in the last 64 of the UK Championship and that result gave a timely boost to McManus' end-of-season ranking where he is now provisionally 57th and nicely clear of danger. McGill is in danger of having a very quiet season if he does not soon get things going. His failure to see off Lu Ning from 5-2 ahead in the last 128 of the UK Championships added to a string of disappointments in the first half of this season that have left him languishing at 68th on the World Grand Prix list and he needs similar heroics to Shaun Murphy in this event and the German Masters if he is to be in Cheltenham in February.
In a mini section of the draw that contains McManus, Dott and Luca Brecel, who needs to make the quarter-finals here to avoid going through the entire of 2018 without a ranking event quarter-final appearance, Scott Donaldson could be the man to come through and make the last 16. He was unlucky to lose 6-4 to fellow Scot Stephen Maguire at the last 64 stage of the UK Championship, but he does actually outrank McGill, Dott and McManus on the one-year list and at 62nd on the provisional end-of-season list he could do with the victories here to put a bit more security.
Marco Fu was the winner here two years ago and he has an excellent record in Scotland over the course of his career. He may not be the same player that he was two years ago since eye troubles have plagued him and halted his progress as he looked to be playing some of his best ever snooker. When he won this title he scored as well as anyone could dream of scoring and having won the Gibraltar Open on the same week in December a year earlier it seems that there is something about this time of year that really gets him playing well. Perhaps his family really go big with their Christmas lists. The season has offered little in the way promise, though he has suffered two last 32 exits to Jack Lisowski which have proved decisive in him falling out of the top 16 for the Masters, just as Robertson did 12 months ago. His last 128 exit at the Northern Irish open to Chen Feilong was a huge shock until Chen then toppled Murphy at the UK Championship, but his comfortable victories in the first two rounds of the UK Championship did offer some hope of a revival and that could start here on a happy hunting ground.
Best of the rest: Scott Donaldson
Quarter choice: Marco Fu
Quarter 4
Last 128 draw: (Picks in bold)
Ding Junhui Vs Niu Zhuang
Robert Milkins Vs Fergal O'Brien
Noppon Saengkham Vs Dominic Dale
Zhao Xintong Vs Ashley Hugill
Ryan Day Vs Rhys Clark
Anthony Hamilton Vs Kurt Maflin
Mark Davis Vs Jamie Clarke
Ken Doherty Vs Zhang Anda
Matthew Stevens Vs Li Yuan
Thepchaiya Un-Nooh Vs Elliot Slessor
Jimmy Robertson Vs Lukas Kleckers
Jack Lisowski Vs Adam Stefanow
Andrew Higginson Vs Joe Swail
Ricky Walden Vs Mark Joyce
David Gilbert Vs Craig McGillivray
Ronnie O'Sullivan Vs Daniel Wells
Ronnie O'Sullivan is the man to catch at the moment as he is winning every other tournament he enters and has not been knocked out prior to a semi-final all season, so he will take some stopping in this quarter. His season started with a victory at the invitational Shanghai Masters. His first UK appearance saw him suffer a surprise semi-final loss to Mark Davis at the English Open, before winning the Champion of Champions and losing a narrow Northern Ireland final to Trump. He looks well-placed currently as well to win the UK Championships for a second year in succession and following his York victory 12 months ago, he would make the quarter-finals of this event before losing to John Higgins for the second year running in Glasgow. With Higgins a quarter above they cannot meet before the semi-finals this time but the list of players you fancy against O'Sullivan is growing shorter and shorter. If he is up for it after a busy few weeks on his calendar, O'Sullivan is a clear favourite to win another title and continue dominating every tournament he enters.
Ding Junhui is not having such a good season and having skipped the first two home nations series events it was a little surprising to see him in the draw for this event. He reached the last 16 at the UK Championships before losing to Martin O'Donnell, who many people would have expected him to beat - despite that putting O'Donnell into his third quarter-final of the season and into the top 16 on this season's money list. If Ding were to suffer an early exit here in Glasgow, his Grand Prix place would be in serious doubt. His participation in the German Masters is by no means a guarantee and he is currently 31st on the qualifying list for Cheltenham. There are certainly players in Robert Milkins, Fergal O'Brien, Noppon Saengkham and Zhao Xintong that have the potential to stop him progressing to the last 16 this week. If that were to happen then his schedule for the rest of the season could be even shorter than his calendar was in the first half of the season.
Jack Lisowski and Thepchaiya Un-Nooh are two immensely naturally gifted players who each have a chance of doing well in Glasgow. It would be an excellently entertaining clash if they were to meet at the last 32 stage. Lisowski secured his Masters debut by defeating Marco Fu to make the last 16 of the UK Championships and even though he would go not further than that in York he is still someone to look at as a potential tournament winner between now and the end of the season. He is starting to build more consistency and that is exactly what is needed to break into but also to stay in the top 16 for an extended period, which must be his ultimate goal. At seventh on this season's money list he is in great form, though will be looking to improve on his two last 32 exits in this season's home nations events. He will be happy to see Trump nowhere near him in the draw, having lost to him on both of those occasions. As for Un-Nooh, he looks to be building some good form of late too. He had a maximum at the English Open before losing narrowly in the last 32 to eventual winner Stuart Bingham. That was followed by a quarter-final at the Northern Ireland Open where he lost to Selby, and his last 64 exit at the UK Championships came after Neil Robertson played six frames of sublime snooker from 3-0 down. If he gets into his stride in Glasgow then he is a serious threat.
Ryan Day may seem like an odd quarter choice given that he took a surprise thumping in round one of the UK Championships, but his quarter-finals at the first two home nations events are the real reason I have picked him out here. He also reached the quarter-finals of the European Masters and the common denominator there is the best-of-7 frame format. With Ding struggling, Day is the player in his half of this quarter that takes the eye. His draw is not easy though he will be expected to make light work of his first round game at the very least, though the same could be said for his first round clash with Joe O'Connor in York. Of course the passage of anyone else in this quarter will largely be reliant on the performance of O'Sullivan, though for fear of picking the Rocket in every event, I see Day as the next best player in this section if he turns up with his new found A game of the last 18 months, rather than the inconsistent and sloppy Z game that has made a couple of appearances this season again.
Ding Junhui is not having such a good season and having skipped the first two home nations series events it was a little surprising to see him in the draw for this event. He reached the last 16 at the UK Championships before losing to Martin O'Donnell, who many people would have expected him to beat - despite that putting O'Donnell into his third quarter-final of the season and into the top 16 on this season's money list. If Ding were to suffer an early exit here in Glasgow, his Grand Prix place would be in serious doubt. His participation in the German Masters is by no means a guarantee and he is currently 31st on the qualifying list for Cheltenham. There are certainly players in Robert Milkins, Fergal O'Brien, Noppon Saengkham and Zhao Xintong that have the potential to stop him progressing to the last 16 this week. If that were to happen then his schedule for the rest of the season could be even shorter than his calendar was in the first half of the season.
Jack Lisowski and Thepchaiya Un-Nooh are two immensely naturally gifted players who each have a chance of doing well in Glasgow. It would be an excellently entertaining clash if they were to meet at the last 32 stage. Lisowski secured his Masters debut by defeating Marco Fu to make the last 16 of the UK Championships and even though he would go not further than that in York he is still someone to look at as a potential tournament winner between now and the end of the season. He is starting to build more consistency and that is exactly what is needed to break into but also to stay in the top 16 for an extended period, which must be his ultimate goal. At seventh on this season's money list he is in great form, though will be looking to improve on his two last 32 exits in this season's home nations events. He will be happy to see Trump nowhere near him in the draw, having lost to him on both of those occasions. As for Un-Nooh, he looks to be building some good form of late too. He had a maximum at the English Open before losing narrowly in the last 32 to eventual winner Stuart Bingham. That was followed by a quarter-final at the Northern Ireland Open where he lost to Selby, and his last 64 exit at the UK Championships came after Neil Robertson played six frames of sublime snooker from 3-0 down. If he gets into his stride in Glasgow then he is a serious threat.
Ryan Day may seem like an odd quarter choice given that he took a surprise thumping in round one of the UK Championships, but his quarter-finals at the first two home nations events are the real reason I have picked him out here. He also reached the quarter-finals of the European Masters and the common denominator there is the best-of-7 frame format. With Ding struggling, Day is the player in his half of this quarter that takes the eye. His draw is not easy though he will be expected to make light work of his first round game at the very least, though the same could be said for his first round clash with Joe O'Connor in York. Of course the passage of anyone else in this quarter will largely be reliant on the performance of O'Sullivan, though for fear of picking the Rocket in every event, I see Day as the next best player in this section if he turns up with his new found A game of the last 18 months, rather than the inconsistent and sloppy Z game that has made a couple of appearances this season again.
Best of the rest: Thepchaiya Un-Nooh
Quarter choice: Ryan Day
Tournament winner selection: Neil Robertson
Once again this tournament is live to watch on Eurosport TV and for UK freeview viewers it will also be on Quest in the afternoons for the first five days before covering all of the weekend's action. As always the tournament is formatted like the rest of the Home Nations Series with four hectic days of best-of-7 frame action before Friday's quarter-finals, Saturday's semi-finals and Sunday's best-of-17 frame final.
Once again this tournament is live to watch on Eurosport TV and for UK freeview viewers it will also be on Quest in the afternoons for the first five days before covering all of the weekend's action. As always the tournament is formatted like the rest of the Home Nations Series with four hectic days of best-of-7 frame action before Friday's quarter-finals, Saturday's semi-finals and Sunday's best-of-17 frame final.
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