The opening match of The Masters as ever sees the defending champion in action which means we get to watch Ronnie O’Sullivan on his home patch right from the start. He takes on Liang Wenbo in the Alexandra Palace opener.
Both men will be looking to make it through to the quarter finals where either Neil Robertson or Ali Carter will be waiting for the winner.
Ronnie O’Sullivan
Ronnie O’Sullivan will be beginning his quest to win an unprecedented seventh Masters title this week which will give him another record in the game if he manages to do it. This is the 23rd time he has made it into this tournament and only three times has he gone out in the first round so he is expected to come through here.
Although he hasn’t won a tournament yet this season O’Sullivan has done everything besides that so he isn’t playing badly. The concern for him heading into the tournament is that whenever he has come up against an elite player this season he has been found wanting and he’ll come up against them at some point this week although maybe not here.
Liang Wenbo
This will be the second time that Liang Wenbo will have competed in this wonderful tournament. He qualified for it for the first time last year but was a 6-4 loser in an epic match against John Higgins in a match they traded century breaks in. Having experienced the event he should be much more comfortable here this year.
It has been a breakthrough season for Wenbo already. He won his first ever major title when he landed the English Open in Manchester and he will be eyeing up another win on English soil this week. This would be the biggest win of his career but he is clearly playing well enough to do some damage.
Head to Head
These two have met seven times in their careers and O’Sullivan as you would expect dominates the record. He has a 6-1 lead but their last two has gone the distance and Wenbo won the match before that so he doesn’t seem to fear O’Sullivan anymore. These are good friends so they should be comfortable against each other.
Betting
O’Sullivan is a heavy favourite with the bookies for this match and I think he will win it but whether he can come through and cover a handicap I’m not so sure. He would need to win 6-3 or better to do that but recent history between the two suggests it could be closer than that so I’ll leave those markets alone.
One thing I think will be a feature of this tournament are centuries. We have the cream of the cream in this tournament and the best scorers in the game, two of which face off here. The centuries line is 1.5 which looks more than fair to me. Both know how to clear the table and with the table likely to be playing well first up I’m expecting more than 1.5 tons here.
Tips
WON – Back Over 1.5 centuries for a 3/10 stake at 2.38 with Coral
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