The professional snooker tour heads back to Scotland for the next week as the third Home Series event takes place in Glasgow. The Coral Scottish Open is the penultimate leg of the series but we already know that Barry Hearn’s £1m bonus is safe after Liang Wenbo failed to win in Belfast last month having landed the English Open.
The fact that the first two Home Series events have been won by what would be classed as surprise winners, winners of their first major title, reminds us that anything can happen this week but most of the big names head north of the border so we should be in for lots of exciting action.
The Format
As with the previous two Home Series tournaments the early stages from the first round through to the last 16 are all the best of seven frames with the quarter finals moving up to the best of nine frames. The semi-finals are the best of 11 and the tournament will be decided with a best of 17 frame final. The draw is pre-determined and has already been released.
Top Quarter
The number one seed this week is Stuart Bingham with the absence of Mark Selby and he heads the names in this quarter. Barry Hawkins, the English Open winner Liang Wenbo and Anthony McGill are the other members of the top 16 in the tournament who are in this quarter.
The rest of the section isn’t weak either although it has got slightly weaker with the withdrawal of Martin Gould in the run up to the tournament. Northern Ireland Open winner Mark King is in this section as is Kurt Maflin with Matthew Stevens and Sam Baird hugely competent players here too.
Second Quarter
Neil Robertson will be hoping this is the place he can launch his season after his recent form has been very questionable. He is the leading player in terms of ranking in this quarter while Shaun Murphy is another star name in it. UK Championship semi-finalist Marco Fu and Mark Williams are the other top 16 members in this section.
The other players in this quarter are full of quality too. Stephen Maguire, Michael White, Michael Holt and Graeme Dott will all be hoping for big weeks to push for a place back in the top 16 while Gary Wilson, Zhou Yuelong, Zhao Xintong, Xiao Guodong and Tom Ford can all beat anyone.
Third Quarter
All eyes will be on Judd Trump in this quarter to see if he can get himself back to form. Another leading name who will be looking for a confidence boosting week is Joe Perry and he’s also in this part of the draw. Ali Carter and Kyren Wilson are the other top seeds here.
A lot of the other players in this part of the draw are lowly ranked or out of form. Dave Gilbert will be looking for a big week while Jamie Jones went well in the UK Championship and will hope to build on that. Ben Woollaston and Thepchaiya Un-Nooh can do their rankings no harm here.
Bottom Quarter
This one looks a brutal section of the draw. Ronnie O’Sullivan is the biggest name in it but John Higgins is the highest ranked and that shows you how strong it is without even mentioning Mark Allen and Ricky Walden who are in this quarter too.
Also in the quarter are Luca Brecel, Peter Ebdon, Alan McManus, Ryan Day and Matt Selt who are all ranked in the top 40 in the world so whoever comes through this part of the draw to the semi-final will certainly have earned their prize money.
Betting
As ever in these things I’ll go for one in each quarter in the hope we can get a couple of them into the latter stages of the tournament and hopefully into the final where the pay-outs are issued.
In the top quarter I’m going to go with Barry Hawkins. Hawkins probably should have won the Northern Ireland Open but I think the title had Mark King’s name written on it that week. He lost in the second round of the UK Championship but ran into that insane performance from Fergal O’Brien so Hawkins has done nothing wrong lately. He has a draw which may well open up so I believe he has every chance of going one better than he did in Belfast this week.
Potentially the most open quarter is the second one with Robertson’s dip in form showing no sign of ending. I took Mark Williams to have a big UK Championship and he was well on the way until he ran into Ronnie O’Sullivan in the quarter final. He couldn’t do a lot about that but he doesn’t have those issues this week so I’m happy to take a chance on him this week.
The third quarter should be an open one too with the two big names not really convincing at the minute. Ali Carter may well be the one to come through there. He recently made a 147 in German Masters qualifying so he’s hitting the ball well and if he has that form with him this week and Trump and Perry continue to flatter to deceive this could be Carter’s week.
I guess O’Sullivan and Higgins are the men to be beaten in the bottom half of the draw but I’m not convinced O’Sullivan is here for any other reason than he is part of the Eurosport team so I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t come through. Higgins is a different proposition but all the pressure is on him.
We saw Mark Allen crack under that pressure in Belfast but he doesn’t have that same scrutiny here. He made two 147s in an exhibition at the weekend so he’s in decent nick and he could be the man to upstage the big names in this quarter.
Tips
Back B.Hawkins to win Scottish Open (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 21.00 with Titanbet (1/2 1-2)
Back him here:
Back M.Williams to win Scottish Open (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 81.00 with Betfred (1/2 1-2)
Back him here:
Back A.Carter to win Scottish Open (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 51.00 with Skybet (1/2 1-2)
Back him here:
Back M.Allen to win Scottish Open (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 23.00 with Bet365 (1/2 1-2)
Back him here:
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