We are four tournaments from the end of an exciting snooker season and the first of those come up in the Gibraltar Open, which gets underway on Friday and which has a very interesting sub-plot to it with Kyren Wilson, Stuart Bingham and Dave Gilbert fighting for the last two spots in next week’s Tour Championship.
Ryan Day landed the title here last year and is around to defend the title, and on the face of it he would look to have every chance of doing so given the absence of many of the big names on the tour for one reason or another.
Recent Winners
2018 – Ryan Day
2017 – Shaun Murphy
2015 – Marco Fu
The Format
As ever this tournament retains the format that was used in the old PTC events before they became extinct. That means that every match in the event is the best-of-seven frames from the first round right through to the final. 128 players enter the tournament. Usually one half of the draw plays one day and the other the next but with players making their way over from the Championship League that is not the case this week. The first three rounds are still played on Friday and Saturday with the last 16 onwards on Sunday.
Top Quarter
As the defending champion Ryan Day is the number one seed and as such he gets the top billing in the top quarter. There aren’t many top 16 players in the entire draw so there isn’t going to be another one here but there will be plenty of attention on this section because Dave Gilbert will look to make the Tour Championship from this quarter. Michael White, Sam Craigie, Mark King, Mark Davis and Noppon Saengkham will all look to make deep runs from this part of the draw.
Second Quarter
Shaun Murphy has had a wretched season but he looks to have a decent chance of a strong run in this tournament and he is the main seed in the second quarter. Luca Brecel is in here too and he could be a threat but having won here before the Magician will be hoping to call on past memories. Ricky Walden, European Masters champion Jimmy Robertson, Yan Bingtao and Michael Georgiou are among those who should be capable of big weekends.
Third Quarter
Barry Hawkins is the main man in this third part of the draw but it is Stuart Bingham who will get much of the attention in it as he looks to secure his place in Wales next week. Anthony McGill, Scott Donaldson, recent Indian Open champion Matt Selt, Zhou Yuelong, Shootout winner Thepchaiya Un-Nooh and Anthony Hamilton can all go deep in the event. Graeme Dott was meant to be in this section but he has withdrawn from this tournament.
Bottom Quarter
This is where the Tour Championship hopes of Kyren Wilson will be decided. He is the leading seed in the bottom quarter as he goes in search of a third title of the campaign. Jack Lisowski would appear the biggest danger to him but there are a number of good players in this section. Zhao Xintong, Joe Perry, Yuan Sijun and Tom Ford can all have big runs here while Robert Milkins and Jimmy White are popular players looking for a boost ahead of the remainder of the campaign.
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Betting
I’ll take a player in each quarter as I always do in these 128 men at the venue events. In the top quarter we’ll go with the English Open finalist Mark Davis. He has threatened a big tournament more and more in recent times and given that this won’t take a whole lot of winning this could be the week he delivers. Davis had a good run in India recently and is off to the China Open so a decent spin here should set up the end of his campaign nicely.
In the second quarter I’ll take a chance on Tian Pengfei. He has had a couple of decent outings in these best-of-seven events this season with a quarter final run in the European Masters and a spin to the last 16 in Scotland. He looked to be hitting the ball nicely in the Shootout recently and having failed to qualify for China this is a big weekend as it is his last competitive outing before the World Championship qualifiers. At 100/1 I’ll pay to see how he goes.
Matt Selt won the Indian Open recently and in truth that probably took more winning than what this one is going to. In these second tier events form can be a massive thing and the confidence of knowing that he can win at big time level should give Selt plenty of belief. With the World Championship on the horizon and China before then he won’t have suddenly stopped working so at 66/1 he’s a big price in a wide open field.
I’ll have a go at Joe Perry in the bottom quarter. He has had tip problems in recent times which is why he’s ducked out of a couple of events earlier than you would have expected him to. One thing that means is that he’ll have been on the practice table bedding a new one in for the remainder of the campaign so he could very easily become a big price pretty quickly at 33/1. Perry went close in the European Masters earlier in the season which was this format in the early stages so he should be a live runner this weekend.
Tips
Back M.Davis to win Gibraltar Open (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 41.00 with BetVictor (1/2 1-2)
Back him here:
Back T.Pengfei to win Gibraltar Open (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 101.00 with Betfred (1/2 1-2)
Back him here:
Back M.Selt to win Gibraltar Open (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 67.00 with Coral (1/2 1-2)
Back him here:
Back J.Perry to win Gibraltar Open (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 34.00 with Boylesports (1/2 1-2)
Back him here:
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