The Home Nations series returns on Monday with the 128 players heading to Crawley for the English Open all doing so with the same goal in mind, to win the tournament and remain in the hunt for the £1 million bonus at the end of the four events.
Stuart Bingham did exactly that when he won the tournament last year and he is back to attempt to defend his title but nearly everyone who is anyone in the game has entered this week so ‘Ballrun’ will need to be at his best to keep the crown.
Recent Winners
2018 – Stuart Bingham
2017 – Ronnie O’Sullivan
2016 – Liang Wenbo
The Format
These Home Nation events have been around for a while now so the format should be familiar. Monday and Tuesday sees the first round of the tournament take place with the second round on Wednesday. Two rounds of action takes place on Thursday with the third round and last 16 on that day. All of those matches are over the best of seven frames.
The four quarter finals will all be played over the course of the two sessions on Friday. They are the best of 9 frames with the two semi-finals on Saturday being the best of 11. The champion is determined on the Sunday in a two-session final which is a race to nine. There is an open draw for the first event of the season so there are some tasty matches right from the start.
Top Quarter
The defending champion of a tournament is the number one seed in it these days which means that it is Stuart Bingham who has that honour and he is in the top quarter. There are four top 16 members in each quarter and the other three men from that section of the rankings in this one are the China Championship winner Shaun Murphy, Kyren Wilson and Ali Carter, both of whom have had runs in this tournament in the past.
One trend of these Home Nations events with it being an open draw outside the top 32 is that each quarter is loaded with good lower ranked players. This one has the best player of the lot outside the top 16 in it in world number 17 Ding Junhui who doesn’t usually play these tournaments. Tom Ford, Anthony McGill, Zhou Yuelong and Martin Gould are other men capable of going deep in this part of the draw while Michael White, Alam McManus and Tian Pengfei might be worth a watch.
Second Quarter
Mark Williams is the highest ranked player in the second quarter and off the back of a run to the final of the China Championship, he will be eyeing up another good week here. He is seeded to meet Neil Robertson in the quarter final but Dave Gilbert and Stephen Maguire are having decent seasons and they’ll be looking to win their first 15 red titles of the season from this part of the draw.
Former world champion Graeme Dott is in this quarter from outside the top 16 while European Masters champion Jimmy Robertson is in here too. Scott Donaldson has gone close in these things in the past while Marco Fu, Ken Doherty, Robert Milkins, Kurt Maflin, beaten finalist last year Mark Davis, Shootout champion Thepchaiya Un-Nooh and World Championship star James Cahill are just some of the other names in this quarter.
Third Quarter
It is this quarter which will get a lot of attention this week. That is because it has the 2017 winner Ronnie O’Sullivan in it. He will be expected to win it but we know from hearing him in the past that these tournaments don’t get him going and it wouldn’t be a complete surprise if he doesn’t offer much here. Mark Selby is the next highest seed in this quarter but his recent record in the UK is awful. Jack Lisowski and Yan Bingtao are the other two men in the quarter looking to take advantage of that.
There are some good names and some excellent rising stars outside the top 16 in this quarter. Yuan Sijun is one of them while Hossein Vafaei comes in here off the back of a decent run in the China Championship. Li Hang, Ryan Day, Xiao Guodong, Indian Open winner Matt Selt and Martin O’Donnell have all shown they have big runs in them in these tournaments.
Bottom Quarter
The world champion Judd Trump is the number two seed and as a result he is the star man in the bottom quarter of the draw although Mark Allen rates as a major danger to him it has to be said. Barry Hawkins can never be ruled out of a tournament while Joe Perry saw off Trump in China recently and will be looking to do it again here if he has to.
As with the other three quarters, there are some decent players in this section who aren’t currently in the top 16 and they include Luca Brecel who is more than capable of taking this event down. World Championship semi-finalist Gary Wilson is also in here. Former Shootout champion Michael Georgiou, Lu Haotian, Mark Joyce, Mark King and Peter Ebdon are just some of the other men looking to go well this week.
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Betting
The way I attack these Home Nations events is to take a player in each quarter in the hope we get a couple through to the quarter finals where the format levels out a little bit. In the top quarter I’m sticking with Shaun Murphy. He has already won for me this season when I took him to win the China Championship and 16/1 is still an acceptable price given the form he is in. He’s a little like Daniil Madvedev in the tennis world as he is currently on a run of three successive finals. He has won the Scottish Open in the past, so Murphy knows how to take these things down. The other top 16 players in his quarter are all out of nick so Murphy should go deep. He’s my main bet once again.
In the second quarter I’ll go with an outsider in the form of Zhao Xintong. I think the Chinese player is going to go in this season having season Yan Bingtao already win a tournament. Xintong beat Ding Junhui and Xiao Guodong at the recent China Championship and only lost to Barry Hawkins in a deciding frame. Neil Robertson is the main man in the quarter if he gets the right Crawley into his sat nav while Mark Williams is a danger too but when he plays well Xintong can beat most in the game and he’s a huge price at 200/1 in a format that suits him well.
Heading into the third quarter and I’ll take Ronnie O’Sullivan on with Jack Lisowski. Taking O’Sullivan on isn’t always a profitable strategy but he has made it quite clear he hates these 128 man events in uninspiring venues. Lisowski will win his first tournament this season. He’s banging the door down too much not to these days. If O’Sullivan does fail there isn’t much else in his quarter in terms of blinding form. 33/1 offers decent value on the talented left-hander whose cueing arm should be well oiled after a week in the Championship League. He can come through this section.
Judd Trump has every chance in the bottom quarter but these early rounds can be a total lottery and there are one or two in his way that could cause him trouble early on so I’m happy to take him on and take Gary Wilson to come out of this quarter and hopefully kick on. Wilson made the semi-final of the six reds and has been playing Championship League recently and he has made the quarter final of the International Championship this term to leave him on the fringes of the top 16. He can make it in there with a win this week and he is too good now to be 100/1 even in this half of the draw.
Tips
Back S.Murphy to win English Open (e/w) for a 1.5/10 stake at 17.00 with Betfred (1/2 1-2)
Back Z.Xintong to win English Open (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 201.00 with Betfred (1/2 1-2)
Back them here:
Back J.Lisowski to win English Open (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 34.00 with Betway (1/2 1-2)
Back him here:
Back G.Wilson to win English Open (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 101.00 with Coral (1/2 1-2)
Back him here:
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