Another day at the snooker factory in Furth as the line-up for the last 16 of the PTC4 event was decided today and it was a day for youth over experience as several young guns progressed. Click below for a round-up…
Having impressed many with his run to the final qualifying round of the Shanghai Masters recently, Thailand’s Passakorn Suwannawat today demonstrated that this run was not a one-off as he won three matches to make it into the last 16. Having seen off the struggling Gerard Greene to get the ball rolling, Passakorn then caused a major surprise by sending world number one Mark Williams crashing out of the tournament before defeating another former world champion in the form of Ken Doherty in the final televised match of the day.
His reward will be a match against Welsh talent Jamie Jones who having risen to prominence during the PTC series last season came back from 3-1 down today to defeat Jack Lisowski in the second round before seeing off last week’s PTC3 winner Ben Woollaston in the last 32. Now up to 41st place in my latest projected seedings list, Jamie is well placed to crack the top 48 come the first seedings revision and continue his rise up the rankings.
Another Welsh player who shone today was Michael White who dispatched Shaun Murphy and Martin Gould today to progress to the last 16 of a PTC event for the first time this season. Whatever happens tomorrow Michael has now put himself right in the running for a top 64 place at the next seedings revision and importantly a place in the Shootout.
More immediately he will now face Fergal O’Brien, the Irish veteran having come through a marathon day which began with a three hour and 49 minute victory against compatriot Joe Delaney. Having survived that encounter he then came through against Rod Lawler in his second match before most impressively recovering from 3-1 behind to see off Ding Junhui in the final last 32 match to get underway this evening.
Elsewhere 2010 world champion Neil Robertson became one of the few top ranked players to make it through to the final day where he will face Mark Joyce, the Pink Ribbon winner having survived a nervy finish against Mark King who recovered from needing two snookers before Joyce got over the line. Having experienced a difficult run recently it was a positive day for Joyce who also saw off Tian Pengfei and Lee Page in previous rounds. A word though for King who despite this narrow loss has at least secured important ranking points as he bids to cling onto a place inside the top 32.
The final two players to progress were Yu Delu and Jimmy Robertson who will meet tomorrow in the bottom half of the draw. Jimmy saw off On Q stablemate Andrew Pagett amongst others while Yu ended the run of Steve Davis who had earlier in the day recorded a break of 131 en route to a narrow victory against Jamie O’Neill.
Finally for those of you wondering, Scotland’s Graeme Dott appears to have missed the tournament due to having lost his passport, according to unconfirmed reports on Twitter anyway.
Who wins from here?