One of the best events of the snooker season begins on Wednesday when the World Championship Qualifying competition gets underway. 128 players head to the English Institute for Sport in Sheffield aiming to win three matches to qualify for the main event at the Crucible Theatre but there is much more at stake than just that.
Although the players ranked 17-32 in the world will be eager to get to the Crucible those behind them, especially those who are not in the top 64 in the rankings, will be desperate for a good run to get there else they face the prospect of dropping off the tour and needing to head to Q-School.
The Format
Although this is a 128 man draw the best way to think of it is 16 eight man tournaments with the winner of each of those tournaments making it through to the Crucible Theatre later in the month. Each match in the qualifying tournament is the best of 19 frames and are played over two sessions. The final round will be next Tuesday and Wednesday with the latter being dubbed Judgement Day and will have its own special programme on the World Snooker facebook page.
Group 1
Ryan Day is the leading player in the world not to have already qualified for the tournament and he is in this group as a result. Robbie Williams is the next best in this group in terms of the rankings with Mitchell Mann and Peter Ebdon the other players from the seeded part of the draw. Those hoping to cause upsets are Jak Jones, James Wattana, Peter Lines and Igor Figueiredo. Ryan Day could come through here.
Group 2
Zhou Yuelong is the main seed in what looks a very open part of the draw. The seeding suggests that he will face Tom Ford in the final qualifying round but Daniel Wells and Liam Highfield will have something to say about that along the way. Ian Preece is among those who need a big week as is Kurt Dunham while Leo Fernandez and Chen Zhe make up the field.
Group 3
This group is all about Xiao Guodong. He qualified for the main event last year and beat Ryan Day when he got there before losing to eventual champion Mark Selby. This looks a competitive little section though with Mark Joyce, Matt Selt and Mei Xi Wen the other seeded players. Those down the rankings in this group are Adam Duffy, Basem Eltahhan, Chris Totten and the Women’s World Champion Ng On Yee.
Group 4
This is the group where Martin Gould will want to escape from. Ben Woollaston has slid down the rankings but is still ranked well enough to be expected to face him in the final qualifying round. Zhang Anda and Stuart Carrington are also in this section. Former finalist Nigel Bond looks to qualify from this group as do Zhang Yong, Kacper Filipiak and Paul Davison.
Group 5
The former world champion Graeme Dott looks to have a good chance of qualifying. He is in group five where he will be opposed by Dominic Dale among others. Mike Dunn and Akani Songsermsawad are the other two seeds with Adrian Ridley, Lukas Kleckers, Reanne Evans and Duane Jones the other players in the section. Dott should fly through here even allowing for the pressure of the situation.
Group 6
This one might just be the most competitive of the lot. Michael Holt is the main seed it in but we’ve seen twice this season what sort of game Elliot Slessor has given that he has beaten Ronnie O’Sullivan twice. Robert Milkins and Scott Donaldson make up a tasty section. Thor Chuan Leong, Eden Sharav, Tyler Rees and the World Seniors champion Aaron Canavan make up the numbers.
Group 7
Anthony Hamilton is seeded to make it back to the Crucible Theatre but if he is to do that he is going to have to come past Li Hang, Lu Haotian and Rory McLeod along the way. I would say that the lower ranked players are among the strongest here too. Ian Burns was a quarter finalist in the Welsh Open a couple of months ago while Ashley Hugill is talented. Fang Xiongman and Martin O’Donnell are the other two players.
Group 8
Mark King will look to qualify for the World Championship for the first time in five years and on paper he has a competitive but certainly not impossible task. Irish duo Fergal O’Brien and Ken Doherty are in this section as is the former finalist Matthew Stevens. Josh Boileau and Gerard Greene add to the Irish flavour of it while Yuan Sijun and Ryan Thomason make up the numbers.
Group 9
Liang Wenbo heads a Chinese looking section in Group 9. He is joined by compatriots Zhao Xintong and Yu Delu while Jamie Jones will be looking to qualify from this section too. Craig Steadman will want a Crucible Theatre return with Sean O’Sullivan, Aditya Mehta and Rod Lawler complete the section.
Group 10
Jack Lisowski has been having a fantastic season and he will hope to crown that with a trip to the Crucible where he would be a dangerous proposition with the right draw. David Grace, Alan McManus, who is defending a bucket load of cash having made the semi-final two years ago, and Oliver Lines are seeded to deny him. Harvey Chandler, Rhys Clark, Chris Keogan and Wang Yuchen needed some big results.
Group 11
This is one of the more interesting groups that is on show as Ricky Walden is set to go up against Cao Yupeng for a place at the Crucible. Both men will feel they should be there so that will be a huge match if they end up meeting. There is a fair bit of snooker to play before then though and Andrew Higginson, David John, Robin Hull, Lee Walker, Kristjan Helguson and Joe Swail will all look to put a spanner in the works.
Group 12
Joe Perry is used to being at the Crucible but he will need to qualify to be there this season. He faces a couple of tough tests though with Mark Davis and the Shootout champion Michael Georgiou in his group. Sam Craigie is another who could make it tough for him. Sanderson Lam, Matthew Bolton, Ross Muir and a certain Jimmy White are also in this section.
Group 13
Yan Bingtao will look to grace the Crucible Theatre for the first time from this part of the draw. Kurt Maflin is ranked to be his biggest danger but in truth that could easily come from Chris Wakelin and Tian Pengfei. Other players looking to get involved in the mix are Li Yuan, Hamza Akbar, Jackson Page and Xu Si. There is a real Chinese flavour to that section.
Group 14
Dave Gilbert will be the main man looking to qualify from this section and having failed to make it to the Crucible last season he will be eager to do so this time around. Gary Wilson and Thepchaiya Un-Nooh look to be his biggest dangers while Alfie Burden needs wins to keep his tour place. Billy Joe Castle, Jamie Curtis-Barrett, Adam Stefanow and Alexander Ursenbacher could keep the four seeds honest.
Group 15
Michael White heads the seeding in the penultimate group of the draw and given the season he has had it would be right for him to make it through but in Jimmy Robertson and Sam Baird he has a couple of tough opponents while John Astley and Soheil Vahedi shouldn’t be underestimated. Niu Zhuang and Alex Borg are competent while Marvin Lim Chun Kiat is an unknown quantity.
Group 16
This group will be all about Stephen Maguire. He should be expected to qualify but nothing is straight forward. Noppon Saengkham has shown form recently while Hossein Vafaei has plenty of talent. Hammad Miah, Chen Zifan, Jamie Cope, Jordan Brown and Allan Taylor will look to take advantage of any slip ups.
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Betting
There are a few bets I like over the course of this qualifying competition with the first of them coming in Group 3 where my instinct tells me that Xiao Guodong should be taken on. He is the rightful favourite but I don’t think he is anything like a certainty to come through and actually I think the long-format preference of Mark Joyce could be the path to glory in this group. We saw in the UK Championship that Joyce enjoys the extended matches and while he has never qualified for this tournament he has made three quarter finals in ranking events this season. That is decent form and at 10/3 he’s value here.
In Group 5 I really expect Graeme Dott to power through. Dott is actually playing some lovely stuff at the minute and he looks a class above anything in his section. You have to respect Dominic Dale and if Dott wasn’t near his best then the Welshman could take advantage but Dott made the final of the German Masters and the Shootout and it has taken Ronnie O’Sullivan twice and Stuart Bingham to knock him out of the last three tournaments. I expect Dott to qualify.
There will be shock qualifiers for the World Championship and once of those could come in Group 8 where Mark King looks very vulnerable having failed to come through qualifying in the last five years. This is a group of the veterans and while the sentimental side of me would like to see Matthew Stevens have another go at world glory I fancy Gerard Greene could be the sleeper. If he can overcome King in the first round then he has shown enough form this season to take down the rest of this group at a massive price.
I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for Jamie Jones when it comes to this tournament and the 8/1 on him coming through Group 9 is enough to lure me in. Liang Wenbo is obviously the favourite and a worthy one at that but he can be inconsistent. Jones is a heavy scorer when he gets on a roll and I’m sure he will put in plenty of practice in the lead up to this tournament. If he can score like he can for a whole week he could come through here.
Speaking of scoring, Sam Craigie was scoring brilliantly in the China Open and he looks to have found himself a nice group in this tournament. Joe Perry is an obvious danger but he can have bad sessions and one of them at the wrong time could end his chances. Davis and Georgiou are entitled to be competitive but if the Craigie who featured in Beijing turns up here he could take them all down at 8/1.
Tips
Back M.Joyce to win Group 3 for a 2/10 stake at 4.33 with Betfair
Back him here:
WON – Back G.Dott to win Group 5 for a 4/10 stake at 2.10 with Coral
WON – Back J.Jones to win Group 9 for a 1/10 stake at 9.00 with Coral
Back them here:
Back G.Greene to win Group 8 for a 1/10 stake at 12.00 with Betfred
Back him here:
Back S.Craigie to win Group 12 for a 1/10 stake at 9.00 with Ladbrokes
Back him here:
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