Thursday 11 September 2014

Shanghai Masters Last 16 round up.

Day four at the 2014 Shanghai Masters and home favouite Ding Junhui stayed firmly on course to defend the title he won here last yr,but not without an early scare against Martin Gould.

As always against the very best player Gould knew he needed a good start here to have a chance and thats what he got,taking the opening frame and a lengthy second to lead 2-0. From here though Ding visibly stepped up a gear and leveled at 2-2 going to the interval.

On the resumption of play Ding extended that lead to 4-2 to stand one away from victory & although Gould managed to pull one back,it was Ding who sealed his place in the last 8 winning the next to secure the 5-3 victory

His quarter final opponent will be Graeme Dott after the Scot won the battle of the former world champions,beating Shaun Murphy 5-3.

World Champion Mark Selby is also well in the hunt for another title after he survived a mid match revival from Michael Holt,which saw Holt level at 3-3 from 3-0 down,to eventually secure a 5-3 win.

Next up for him is Irish veteran Fergal O'Brien,who continued his decent start to the season by defeating Zhao Xindong 5-3.

A free scoring start to this saw the opening six frames shared in this one,before things got a little scrappier & the experience of the Dubliner showed as he ran out a 5-3 winner.Although he did reach the final of a PTC event last yr this is the first time Fergal has reached a full ranking quarter final since 2007. A hard worker at his game,he will not be intimidated by playing the World champ
tomorrow.

Talking of veterans,Alan McManus continued his recent resurgence,following up his victory over Ronnie in the last round with a comprehensive 5-1 defeat of his fellow Scot Stephen Maguire here.

It has really been a remarkable few monthes for McManus,who was a quarter finalist at the Crucible in April & he will go into his last 8 encounter with Stuart Bingham here brimming with confidence.Bingham for his part reached this stage with an easy 5-1 dismissal of Dominic Dale.

Tee remaining Quarter final could potentially be the most exciting as Mark Allen takes on Michael White.

Allen reached this stage with a 5-1 victory over Mark Williams & White defeated fellow Welshman Ryan Day 5-2.

So there we have it.8 will become 4 tomorrow as we  approach the business end of things over the weekend. The draw points to a Ding v Selby final,but when have such things in our sport ever been straight forward!

Quarter Final draw 
Ding Junhui v Graeme Dott
Alan McManus v Stuart Bingham
Mark Allen v Michael White
Mark Selby Fergal O'Brien

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