The Scottish Open title will be won on Sunday and we know that we will be guaranteed a new name on the Stephen Hendry Trophy when two Chinese talents meet as Lei Peifan takes on Wu Yize in an exciting looking final.
One of these two men will have the biggest day of their life by winning a first ranking event title and all the many benefits that come with triumphing in a major event. The other will be left to reflect on a good week but one with a what might have been feel to it.
Lei Peifan
I think it is fair to say that when Lei Peifan headed to Edinburgh for this tournament being in the final would have been beyond his wildest dreams when you consider that he had never even reached the quarter final of a ranking event in the past. He has been on and off the tour in recent years and that is still seen as a negative even though that is the career path that the reigning world champion was forced to take. He has battled hard and made his way through to this final though.
I think it is also fair to suggest that Peifan has ridden his luck this week. He was 3-1 down to Stuart Bingham in the round of 16 and 5-2 behind to Mark Allen in the semi-final and in both matches you sensed he was waiting to be put out of his misery but neither man was able to do it. The longer the week has gone on, the more you wonder if his name is already on the trophy. He will hope that is the case in his first major final.
Wu Yize
Wu Yize isn’t what you would call established in the top level of the game but he is breaking through in some style this season and this will be the second Home Nations final that he has competing in during this campaign. The first one didn’t go to plan when he lost 9-7 to Neil Robertson at the English Open having made a bit of a mess of the first session but he wouldn’t have been the favourite in that match. He will be here so it will be interesting to see if he can justify that tag.
There is no doubting that he has been the best player in the tournament so far this week. He has played some lovely snooker and while he has had to come through a couple of deciding frames en route to this final, he fully merits his spot in the title showdown and having had that experience of the final day in Brentwood and getting much better in that final the longer it went on, you get the impression that he will play his best snooker in this final.
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Head-to-head
We have no history to guide us in this final because this will be the first time that these two Chinese youngsters have ever met. It is the first final in the career of Lei Peifan and only the second for Wu Yize so there is a clean slate in terms of the head-to-head going into this title match.
Betting
I do think this final is all about Wu Yize and I don’t think a 2.5 frame handicap is a big enough one to contain him based on what we have seen the longer that this week has gone on. Peifan has only made two breaks over 70 all week and while he deserves a lot of credit for battling past much more established opponents this week, you would imagine in a title match against a player getting better the longer the week has gone on, the least Peifan is going to need to do here is score.
Wu Yize has scored well all week. He has made an 80 break in every match apart from one and has been drilling in long pots from all angles throughout the tournament. The Lei Peifan long game completely left him on Saturday night where he should have been beaten and to make matters worse that semi-final didn’t end until gone midnight so he won’t have had any time to recapture his poise from distance. Wu Yize looks to be flushing it right now and it would be a huge surprise if he doesn’t land his first title here and I’ll back him to do that with a bit in hand.
Tips
Back W.Yize (-2.5 frames) to beat L.Peifan for a 3/10 stake at 2.00 with Boylesports
Back him here:
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