We move into day four of the World Championship snooker on Tuesday and the big names in the game keep on coming across the three sessions of play inside the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield.
Tournament favourite Judd Trump gets his campaign underway on Tuesday while Ding Junhui and John Higgins will be concluding their first round matches so it should be a high quality day of snooker.
Day 3 Recap
Monday saw wins for Stuart Bingham, Shaun Murphy, Mark Allen and Marco Fu as we still await the first real shock of the tournament. Bingham eased through 10-5 but the other three were made to work very hard.
Fu’s win earned us one of two winning bets on the day with us taking him to complete an amazing comeback at 6/1. Yan Bingtao’s rally in the afternoon session earned us a winner in the total frames in that one too so Monday was a very satisfactory day for us.
There are two matches in progress heading into Tuesday. Ding Junhui was in fine form in opening up a 7-2 lead on Zhou Yuelong. He banged in three centuries including the highest break of the tournament so far, a 136 break. John Higgins was equally as impressive in leading Martin Gould 7-2 and both should complete comfortable wins on Tuesday.
Liang Wenbo vs Stuart Carrington
There is one match that begins in the morning on Tuesday and ends in the evening and it is the one between Liang Wenbo and Stuart Carrington. Carrington was the man who denied Mark Williams another Crucible appearance and that win in the final round of qualifying should have tuned him up nicely for this.
This has been a breakthrough season for Liang Wenbo in that he won his first tour title when he landed the English Open. Since then you would have to say he has been quite quiet although I don’t think the two are related in any way.
I’m never as comfortable with Liang when he is a heavy favourite as I am when he is an outsider and he is clearly a warm favourite for this match. He is up against a perfectly capable opponent here in Carrington too. Whether Carrington can hold himself together to win remains to be seen but the fact he stormed past Williams in the qualifiers suggests he can. I think he’s value in this match.
Judd Trump vs Rory McLeod
The one match to get off in the afternoon session is the age old tortoise and the hare clash as Judd Trump goes up against the snail paced Rory McLeod. The two have met eight times in the last and it is Trump with a 6-2 lead including 4-0 and 4-1 wins in their last two meetings.
I give credit to McLeod for coming through qualifying, as I do all who held themselves together to win three matches at Ponds Forge, but he had an incredibly soft draw with the world no 98 the highest ranked player he played in the three matches.
Trump is a few levels above that and a good level or two above McLeod too and I expect that to play out here. I don’t envisage too many in the way of one-sided wins in this round but this is one I do think that will be the case.
Ali Carter vs Graeme Dott
The evening match sees the twice runner up Ali Carter taking on the Crucible specialist Graeme Dott in a match which has all the makings of being a tight and tense tussle. These two are quite similar and while Carter has the extra class Dott certainly doesn’t lack for fighting spirit, heart or determination.
I’m on Carter outright anyway so I don’t need to get involved in this match and in truth the prices and the lines for it look about right. Something might materialise at half way but until then I’ll sit it out and hope Carter looks good.
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Tips
Back S.Carrington to beat L.Wenbo for a 3/10 stake at 3.50 with Winner Sports
Back him here:
Back J.Trump (-5.5 frames) to beat R.McLeod for a 4/10 stake at 1.91 with Paddy Power
Back him here:
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