It is the final day of qualifying in the International Championship on Monday with those who are yet to compete for a place in the main draw later in the season doing so up in Ponds Forge in Sheffield with spots on the plane to China the reward for the winners.
We got off the mark for this qualifying event on Sunday and have three sessions of play on Monday to look for bets to try and get back towards even for the competition ahead of a few days off prior to the World Cup.
Morning Session
Tom Ford is the highest ranked player on show in the morning session on Monday morning. He will be on one of the streamed tables when he takes on Fraser Patrick while on the other main table Martin Gould will be in action against Harvey Chandler. There are three matches on the outside tables in this session with Liam Highfield playing the recent Q-School graduate Si Jiahui on one and Billy Joe Castle facing Robbie Williams on another. Two Chinese players also meet when Lu Ning plays Zhang Anda.
Afternoon Session
Hossein Vafaei is the star performer in the afternoon session. He is on one of the streamed tables when he takes on Dominic Dale in what should be an entertaining match while on the other main table we have Andrew Higginson looking to do his thing when he meets Xu Si. Elsewhere there is an all-Welsh battle between Matthew Stevens and Kishan Hirani, while Chris Wakelin goes up against Ross Bulman. The other match sees Scott Donaldson taking on Ian Burns for a place in China.
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Evening Session
The final session of the qualifying competition sees Kyren Wilson and Stephen Maguire looking to book their spots into the main event. As you would expect, both are on the main tables with Wilson meeting Brandon Sargeant while Maguire takes on a Jamie O’Neill who should be confident after knocking Barry Hawkins out of Riga Masters qualifying. Fergal O’Brien meets Lee Walker in a match which might put a few to sleep on the outside tables with the other match seeing Stuart Carrington playing Kacper Filipiak.
Betting
I’ll finish off the qualifying competition with one bet and it comes in the afternoon session where I expect Hossein Vafaei to take care of Dominic Dale with a little bit in hand. I took Dale on in Riga Masters qualifying and he lost for me and he now goes up against a better player than he did then and over the longer distance so I’m not sure what the Spaceman has going for him. I mentioned he is at the end of his career when taking him on in the Riga event and obviously that remains the case here.
Vafaei is a really good player and in my eyes it is only a matter of time before he goes really deep in tournaments. I’m talking finals and winning them and forcing his way into the big Coral events and the top 16 etc. In order to do that he could do with winning here. I think he’s now at the level where he is better over the longer distances and as such I fancy him to cover a 1.5 frame start in this one. He can win no worse than 6-4.
Tips
Back H.Vafaei (-1.5 frames) to beat D.Dale for a 4/10 stake at 1.91 with Boylesports
Back him here:
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