The second day of the Northern Ireland Open sees the first round of the tournament finishing inside the behind closed doors setup in the Marshall Arena in Milton Keynes on Tuesday as those yet to get up and running for the event have the chance to do so.
The first day on Monday saw the likes of Judd Trump, Kyren Wilson and Mark Williams ease into the second round and on Tuesday players such as Neil Robertson, John Higgins, Mark Selby and Ding Junhui will be looking to join them.
Morning Session
Thepchaiya Un-Nooh is the big name on show in the morning session on Tuesday and he’ll be on the main table as a result. The Thai is currently sat in the top 16 and if he can be there at the end of the UK Championship he’ll be in The Masters but there is a queue of players ready to overtake him so his first round clash with Peter Devlin is hugely important. The other matches that will be streamed in this session see Tom Ford taking on Lee Walker, Zhao Xintong meeting Si Jiahui and former winner Mark King meeting Zak Surety.
There are four other matches in the session with Barry Pinches meeting Liam Highfield in one of those games while the former world finalist Nigel Bond will go up against the tour newcomer Jamie Wilson in another match. The other two clashes in this section sees the German player Lukas Kleckers meeting the impressive Chinese youngster Chang Bingyu and Stuart Carrington will take on Billy Joe Castle.
Afternoon Session
The afternoon session is once again split into three parts with Neil Robertson being the headline act in the first part of it. He will be on the main table when he takes on the ‘home’ amateur Declan Lavery while the streamed table will have Ding Junhui beginning his campaign when he faces Eden Sharav. The other two matches sees Pang Junxu facing Jak Jones and Mark Joyce going up against a Dominic Dale who emphatically qualified for the German Masters last week.
The TV match in the second wave of afternoon matches sees the European Masters winner Mark Selby on the main table. He has a tricky test against Andrew Higginson while over on the streamed table Barry Hawkins meets Alan McManus in a big game for both me. There are three other matches in this session with Ali Carter meeting Ben Hancorn, Sunny Akani facing Jordan Brown and Yuan Sijun taking on Luo Honghao.
Matthew Stevens will be on the TV table if a third match is shown live. He meets the former European Masters winner Jimmy Robertson while elsewhere in this session Fergal O’Brien faces Ashley Hugill, James Cahill meets Lyu Haotian and there is also the chance for two lower ranked players to earn a few quid and make it into the second round when Zhao Jianbo meets the French amateur player Brian Ochoiski.
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Evening Session
John Higgins is the main draw in the evening session on Tuesday and he’ll start his campaign on the TV table against Daniel Wells. Stuart Bingham will be given the honour of playing on the streamed table when he takes on Oliver Lines in a match which could very easily go either way. Elsewhere we have Iulian Boiko taking on Michael White, Ben Woollaston facing Ricky Walden and Patrick Wallace meets Farakh Ajaib.
There is another set of evening matches as well and they see the ‘home’ star Mark Allen in action on the TV table when he looks to back up his win at the Champion of Champions when he goes up against Anthony Hamilton. The streamed action will see Joe Perry going up against the competent Robbie Williams who had a good run in the English Open. The other two matches sees Allan Taylor taking on Hossein Vafaei and Elliot Slessor meeting Li Hang.
Betting
I’ll take a couple of bets over the course of the morning and afternoon with the first of them coming in the form of Peter Devlin who showed during the European Masters that he has got something about him. He made it through to the last 16 of that competition where he beat Mark Williams along the way and held his nerve very well in a deciding frame in that match. He was eventually beaten by runner up Martin Gould but followed that up with a competitive showing against Kurt Maflin in the English Open and won his opening match in the German Masters last week. I’m not convinced he will beat Thepchaiya Un-Nooh but you can get a perfectly acceptable 4/5 on him winning a couple of frames, which he may well have done had the Thai been in form and playing with freedom but that isn’t the case. Un-Nooh isn’t in the best form and he is playing for a place in The Masters. I get the feeling that if Un-Nooh wins he won’t win before Devlin gets to two frames.
Later in the day I like the idea of Jordan Brown beating Sunny Akani. Brown is a player on the up. I think we saw that at the end of last season when he qualified for the World Championship and gave a good account of himself against Mark Selby in the first round at the Crucible. Since then he has won his first match at the first two completed tournaments before running into a top level opponent and he has also qualified for the German Masters. Other than a win against Stephen Maguire in the first round of the English Open in a match I’m not entirely convinced the Scot fancied the job in, Akani hasn’t won a match away from the Championship League this season. He seems to have plateaued if not faded a little so I’m happy to take the man on the up in this one particularly in his home tournament even if he isn’t actually playing it at home.
Tips
WON – Back P.Devlin (+2.5 frames) to beat T.Un-Nooh for a 3/10 stake at 1.80 with William Hill
Back him here:
Back J.Brown to beat S.Akani for a 3/10 stake at 2.00 with Coral
Back him here:
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