The second quarter final of The Masters sees two giant killers back in action as Marco Fu takes on Mark Allen at the Alexandra Palace in London on Thursday evening. A place in the semi-final awaits the winner where they will meet either Neil Robertson or Ronnie O’Sullivan.
Marco Fu
When Marco Fu trailed Judd Trump 3-0 in the first round he could be forgiven for thinking about his next tournament but that isn’t Marco’s style and he responded with a barrage of big breaks and eventually got his man in a deciding frame in what was the match of the tournament thus far.
Fu nailed three centuries in that match to back up his excellent form from his win in Scotland so there might not be a better player on the planet right now. There certainly can’t be many who are in better form and if he has that with him here he is going to take an awful lot of beating in this match.
Mark Allen
It wasn’t just Marco Fu who was beating a big name in a deciding frame and bashing in centuries along the way. That is exactly what Mark Allen did in beating John Higgins in the first round and the one thing we know about Mark Allen is he craves the big stage so he is going to relish being in the arena in this match.
Allen has made it to the semi-final of this tournament before so he is used to winning big matches. I thought it was strange that he said he didn’t feel comfortable in his first match because he certainly didn’t look nervy or uncomfortable in any way. Allen made a century and three other decent breaks against Higgins.
Head to Head
These two have met 13 times in all competitions in their careers but this will be their first meeting since 2013. Allen has eight wins to Fu’s five overall but Fu has won two of the last three. In The Masters they have met once which was in the semi-final of 2011 which Fu won 6-4.
Betting
Given the recent form of the two and the way they played in the first match I’m with Marco Fu here. He is playing some sensational snooker right now and I don’t see Mark Allen shutting the game down and closing Fu up so there is no reason why Fu won’t win again here. He is striking the ball so well and you only have to look at him around the table to see he is oozing confidence. I fancy that will equate to a Fu win here.
I’m also going to take the centuries to keep coming. I’m not surprised how many centuries are going in this week. I mentioned it in the very first match preview that I could see it being a trend and it has been. The line here is 1.5 which both are good enough to cover on their own if they play well. Whether one does it or both hit one I think we’ll see at least two tons here.
Tips
WON – Back M.Fu to beat M.Allen for a 4/10 stake at 1.85 with Betfair
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Back M.Fu vs M.Allen – Over 1.5 centuries for a 4/10 stake at 1.91 with Bet365
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