The opening day of the Champion of Champions takes place in Bolton on Monday and it sees the former world champion Mark Selby headlining a day where four players will look to make it through to the overall semi-final of the tournament.
As will be the case for the first four days this week, the format will see the four players in Group 2 competing in a best of seven semi-final in the afternoon session before the two winners meet in the group final over the best of 11 in the evening.
Mark Selby vs Lee Walker
The opening match of the tournament will see the only player in this event off the world rankings in Mark Selby going up against the World Seniors champion Lee Walker for a place in the Group 2 final later in the day.
Selby goes into the match as a pretty emphatic favourite as you would expect given that he is one of the best players around and Walker is no longer on the tour, but we’ve seen in the past that recent form doesn’t always count for a whole lot here. You would imagine this could turn into quite a tough watch because Walker matches often get scrappy and Selby isn’t always involved in the most fluent of encounters either. I’ve got to think the recent experience that Selby has had on the big stage will serve him well here but I’m not really interested in getting involved at the odds.
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John Higgins vs Hossein Vafaei
The second group semi-final on Monday afternoon sees the non-ranking Championship League winner John Higgins going up against the man who won the Shootout in the form of Hossein Vafaei with the winner meeting the player who came out on top in the earlier game in the group final.
The last time we saw Higgins on ITV he was visibly fuming at letting a match slip against Yuan Sijun at the British Open and although he then went to Hong Kong and only got taken out by a Marco Fu 147 in the deciding frame of their semi-final. He then offered little to no resistance to Rob Milkins in Northern Ireland recently so the Scot is blowing very hot and cold at the minute. Vafaei is very much a player on the up but he hasn’t had many appealing results this season. As ever in the snooker world though it is all about waiting for your time to come and I suspect he is a player who is ready to come good in these environments now. He made a 147 at the beginning of the season and can be a heavy scorer and if Higgins is off colour here the Iranian is perfectly capable of taking him down.
Group Betting
The favourite to win Group 2 is Mark Selby and that is completely understandable because he looks to have much the easier route through to the group final which is significant not just because he is most likely to be in it but he is first up in the semi-finals so he’ll have longer to rest and recover ahead of the final, especially if the second match of the day turns out to be a close contest, which it very easily could be.
Who he will face in that final is less known. I fancy it could be Vafaei but Higgins is the favourite. I think Higgins would give Selby a decent game while Vafaei will know that he walloped Selby in the UK Championship last season. My gut feeling is to take Selby on and given what happens in the earlier matches I might well do that but as his opponent is anything but guaranteed it is hard to bet on the group at the outset.
Tips
Back H.Vafaei to beat J.Higgins for a 3/10 stake at 3.10 with William Hill
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