This Wednesday sees the start of the 2009 China Open qualifiers in Prestatyn as those players not involved in the Masters or the Championship League play their first professional matches since the UK Championship in early December. Click below for the details on the draw…
Qualifying Preview
No doubt what many people will be wanting to know is how does Jimmy White’s path look like as he attempts to qualify for the TV stages of another ranking event. The answer is potentially quite tricky as at the very bottom of the draw he comes up against Chinese youngster Li Hang in the opening round. While Hang is just 18 years old, ranked 67th provisionally he is also the highest ranked main tour debutant and has already won an impressive seven matches in ranking events this season. In White’s favour however is the fact that when they met earlier on in the season in qualifying for the Shanghai Masters, Jimmy ran out a 5-3 winner and he will be hoping to do the same again.
Waiting for the winner will be Martin Gould, Andrew Higginson and in the final qualifying round Fergal O’Brien who has not enjoyed the best of seasons so far. While it is not an easy path by any means, with the likes of Mark Williams, Ken Doherty, Judd Trump and Ricky Walden in the draw, it could have been worse for White. Whoever does make it however will come up against world number one Ronnie O’Sullivan out in China so perhaps it is not such a great section of the draw to be in!
Other interesting ties in round one include Atthasit Mahitthi vs Matthew Couch, two players who both looked to be in decent form when I saw them at the EISS for the UK Championship qualifiers last month and have had strong seasons so far. I am also interested to see how the likes of Stephen Craigie Vincent Muldoon and Daniel Wells perform against Lee Spick, Lewis Roberts and Wayne Cooper as their fight to stay on the main tour for next season reaches a critical stage.
Looking further up the draw, if Judd Trump can win his opening match against either Barry Pinches, Kuldesh Johal or Michael Georgiou, lying in wait will be the 1997 World Champion Ken Doherty who he last met in qualifying for the Masters last month. Given that the winner will have a tie with the woefully out of form Peter Ebdon in China, potentially there is a real opportunity for one of them to have a really good run in the event.
Welsh duo Mark Williams and Matthew Stevens both look to have a good opportunity to progress here as if they win their qualifying matches, Graeme Dott and Mark King lie in wait in the last 32. That said Graeme Dott just looks to be coming into a bit of form so if Stevens can get that far, success is far from a formality. To do so though he might have to beat fellow Welshman Daniel Wells, or perhaps more likely Telford’s Adrian Gunnell who has enjoyed a decent season so far.
Finally although the match will be held over to China, we again have the prospect of seeing Joe Swail and Liang Wenbo lock horns again in what is becoming quite a rivalry between the two. Having lost out to Liang in heartbreaking circumstances at the Crucible last year, Joe was delighted to get his revenge last month in the UK Championship and his celebrations that day in the EISS said it all. With crucial ranking points and a last 32 clash with Stephen Hendry at stake, this promises to be another match of high drama, if Liang Wenbo can overcome either Rob Milkins, Paul Davison or Andrew Pagett in his first match of course.
The seeds
Although it is hard to look at the draw for the seeds right now given that the qualifiers have not been played yet and the final stages of the event will not take place for a couple of months yet, it is possible to draw some conclusions at this stage.
The most obvious of which is what a horrible draw world number one Ronnie O’Sullivan has been given! If he can overcome his first round match then he looks like facing either Ding Junhui or Ian McCulloch, with potentially John Higgins, or Marco Fu waiting in the quarter-finals. Then in the semi-finals could be Shaun Murphy, Ryan Day or Neil Robertson, all of whom have reached finals this season. If he manages to win this tournament then it looks safe to say that he won’t have had it easy, though you still wouldn’t bet against him would you?
As an aside if we do see Higgins v Fu again in the last 16 then hopefully it will be every bit as exciting as their Masters clash just last week.
In the top half, defending champion Stephen Maguire could potentially face a tough opening round match against Dave Harold though it has to be said that the Stoke potter is not looking quite as impressive as he did early on in the season. If he can win then it doesn’t get any easier however as Judd Trump, Ken Doherty or Peter Ebdon would probably lie in wait in the last 16.
Other big names in the top half include Masters finalist Mark Selby, Joe Perry (who must be thanking his lucky stars that he has avoided O’Sullivan for once), and Ali Carter who has been consistently strong this season. Despite this however I would probably say that the bottom half looks the stronger in this tournament, particularly as it contains four this season’s five ranking event winners, so perhaps there is an opportunity for those in the top section to string a run of wins together.