The biggest invitation event of the snooker season gets underway inside Alexandra Palace on Sunday afternoon when the opening match of The Masters is played out as the world champion Luca Brecel goes up against Jack Lisowski.
These are two of the most entertaining players in the game right now and they have an ideal platform to show their best snooker on. If both come to the party when we should be in for a great start to the tournament.
Jack Lisowski
Prior to Christmas this had been a pretty quiet season for Jack Lisowski but then he went to Macau for the holiday period and made the final of the second event out there, making a maximum in the title showdown, so you would think that will have restored some of the confidence we know that he is rarely short of. Making the final of that tournament should also fuel the fire to push on and get his hands on silverware and here would be a fine place to pick up a first trophy.
Lisowski has shown over the last couple of seasons that he can deliver the goods on the big stages, he has just failed to do it throughout the course of a week and that will be something he will look to do here. Lisowski hadn’t won a match here prior to last year but he put that record right, reaching the semi-final, although he certainly won’t want to be reminded of that experience given that he lost 6-0 to Mark Williams. He might have a point to prove here.
Luca Brecel
When you are the world champion like Luca Brecel is, events of this magnitude carry even more weight and it will be interesting to see how the Belgian goes about his work here. He hasn’t really delivered much in the way of positive results since he won the World Championship but if there is one thing we know about Brecel it is that he is an entertainer and he will relish the chance to perform in front of a big crowd.
It has to be said that he doesn’t have a great record of performing in front of this crowd though. He has only won one match in three visits to this tournament and he needed a deciding frame to beat Mark Allen in that. That makes you think that Brecel will need a good start because although he can reel off three frames in a little more than half an hour, his poor record at the venue might enter his head if he gets off to something of a struggle at the beginning.
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Head-to-head
These two men have met on five previous occasions and it is Jack Lisowski who has a 3-2 lead on the world champion. He also sits with a 17-13 advantage on the frame count so he has had a fair edge in their meetings. Luca Brecel won their last meeting though which came at the Players Championship last season. This will be the first time the pair have met at The Masters but they have played each other over the best of 11. That was in that clash in the Players Championship which Brecel won 6-4. They have played in the last 16 of a tournament twice. They have won one of those matches each so there isn’t a lot between the two historically.
Betting
Jack Lisowski didn’t just play well in Macau a couple of weeks ago, he scored like an absolute dream. He made five centuries in winning six frames against Kyren Wilson in the quarter final and then made that maximum in the final so he looks to be hitting the ball really well and when you consider that Luca Brecel certainly isn’t shabby in the scoring department and neither of these players are going to want to get tied down with safety play, I’m expecting quite an open match.
You can get even money on over 1.5 centuries to start this tournament and that feels like a value price. We see in almost every tournament that the tables play easier on the opening day while they bed in and these two are perfect exponents to take advantage of that. With Lisowski scoring like a dream and Brecel never lacking in confidence there is every reason to think that we are going to be treated to a very entertaining game here, one which can have at least two tons before the final ball is potted.
Tips
Back Over 1.5 centuries for a 3/10 stake at 2.00 with Coral
