The first bunch of players will begin their final tournament of the season on Wednesday when the World Championship Qualifiers get underway inside the English Institute for Sport with a host of stars looking to take the first step towards reaching the Crucible Theatre.
There are three sessions of action on the opening day of qualifying with those in play in the first one returning in the evening to conclude their matches. The players on show in the afternoon session come back on Thursday to end their games.
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Morning Session
There are two streamed tables on show for every session of the first two rounds and they will be occupied in this morning period, and indeed the evening, by European Masters winner Jimmy Robertson, who begins his quest for a spot at the main event when he takes on Chen Feilong. Michael Holt is on show on the other streamed table when he takes on the amateur Brandon Sargeant.
The outside tables will be full for this session as you would expect. Former Shootout champion Michael Georgiou is up on one of them when he takes on Lee Walker while Peter Ebdon goes up against Harvey Chandler. Mei Xi Wen will be expecting to come through against Austrian amateur Florian Nuessle while Yan Bingtao meets Lukas Kleckers. Mark Joyce will take on Billy Joe Castle in another match with the current Shootout winner Thepchaiya Un-Nooh facing Jonathan Bagley. The other matches see Joe O’Connor taking on Joe Swail, Xiao Guodong meeting Jak Jones and Peter Lines plays Michael Judge.
Afternoon Session
There are two more matches on the streamed tables in this afternoon session. The first of those sees Hossein Vafaei going up against Zhang Anda in what looks like one of the matches of the opening round. Matthew Selt, winner of the Indian Open earlier in the season, faces Dylan Emery on the other main table on Wednesday afternoon.
Eight other matches take place in this session and they include Gary Wilson against Sanderson Lam, the all-Welsh clash between Daniel Wells and Jamie Clarke, Gerard Greene and Aaron Hill as well as Martin Gould taking on Mostafa Dorgham. Andrew Higginson goes up against James Cahill while two veterans meet when Anthony Hamilton takes on James Wattana. The other two matches sees Xhao Xintong taking on Adam Lilley and Noppon Saengkham meeting Adam Stefanow.
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Betting
I’ll begin things off with just the one bet on the opening day of qualifying although as ever I’ll assess the situation at the end of each session. The bet I like comes in the form of the Shootout champion Thepchaiya Un-Nooh, who I’m expecting to breeze into the second round of the tournament at the expense of Jonathan Bagley.
Bagley is here by virtue of his efforts on the seniors tour but anyone who watches him in that will know he isn’t the heaviest scorer going around and if you are going to get the better of the Thai star, or even run him close, then you are going to have to score. Un-Nooh is a tournament winner now and if he hits the ball here as well as he did in Watford he’ll take some real stopping. With chances likely to come his way regularly, and him unlikely to be punished for his misses, I’m expecting Un-Nooh to win this no worse than 10-3.
Tips
Back T.Un-Nooh (-6.5 frames) to beat J.Bagley for a 4/10 stake at 2.13 with NetBet
Back him here:
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