The first day of the English Open is a very busy one as the first round of the tournament gets underway. There are 32 matches being played across three sessions of play up in Manchester with the action coming thick and fast.
Although the previous tournament only finished on Sunday there are plenty of big names on show on Monday although those who went deep in Bucharest have been given the day off to get back ahead of their tournament openers on Tuesday.
Morning Session
There is just the one set of matches being played in the morning session with eight games on show in total. Two of them are on the TV tables and they see Stephen Maguire playing Gareth Allen and Dechawat Poomjaeng against John Astley.
Elsewhere to open things off there is an all-Thai battle between Boonyarit Keattikun and Kritsanut Lertsattayathorn. You have to pity the referee in that one! Sam Craigie meets Liam Highfield while Li Hang plays Alex Borg and James Wattana goes up against Eden Sharav. In the other two games James Cahill plays Adan Stefanow and Ian Burns meets Christopher Keogan.
Afternoon Session
There are 16 matches in this session which will be played in three batches. The first group of matches sees eight games being played in total with the TV line up being Zhou Yuelong against Jimmy White and Ding Junhui against Mitchell Mann.
The other six matches to begin this session are Mark King against Thor Chuan Leong, Itaro Santos of Brazil taking on Joe Swail, Oliver Lines plays Ian Preece, Mark Joyce against Craig Steadman as well as Ross Muir against Zhang Yong and Akani Songsermsawad against Kurt Dunham.
There are four matches to follow those initial games with a couple of Welshmen on the TV tables. Michael White meets Jason Weston in one of them and Mark Williams faces David John. In the other two matches Josh Boileau plays Zhang Anda and Adam Duffy meets Anthony Hamilton.
The session finishes with a couple of TV matches which see Ryan Day facing Kurt Maflin and Kyren Wilson playing Wayne Townsend. The session concludes on the outside tables with Sam Baird against Elliot Slessor and Jak Jones versus Brandon Sargeant.
Evening Session
This session will be played out in two sets of four matches. Both sessions have two matches on the TV tables and two off of them. Matthew Stevens takes on Jamie Bodle in one of the first set of games with Stuart Bingham meeting Robert Milkins in the other. Away from the TV Alan McManus plays Thepchaiya Un-Nooh and Peter Ebdon plays Stuart Carrington.
The second set of matches will see Martin Gould taking on Sydney Wilson on one of the TV tables with Joe Perry playing Matthew Selt on the other. Elsewhere Chris Wakelin will play Allan Taylor and Aditya Mehta will face Lee Walker.
Betting
Matches are going to come thick and fast this week and the important thing is not to go on the attack with plenty of bets. This is very much a tournament to be selective especially in the first couple of days which are pretty hectic and that is what I’m going to do. There are just two bets I like for this first day.
I’ve backed Anthony Hamilton in recent tournaments but he just can’t seem to get over the line at the minute and men who are struggling to finish matches off are going to be vulnerable to solid scorers and in Adam Duffy he faces one of them. Duffy is back on the main tour and looking to climb up the rankings and in order to do that he needs to win matches like these. I like Duffy over this distance and he’s decent value at odds against.
One of the matches of the opening day is the one between Alan McManus and Thepchaiya Un-Nooh as it puts together an interesting blend of styles. McManus has a safety first approach whereas Un-Nooh is attacking at all times. Usually McManus’ style allows him to be comfortable and get into matches but the fact Un-Nooh pots balls from all angles he doesn’t seem to get into matches against the Thai.
The two have met four times and Un-Nooh has won all four which tells me he has a style that McManus can’t counter. The Scot certainly can’t win a scoring contest against the Thai so I’m with Un-Nooh in this one.
Tips
Back A.Duffy to beat A.Hamilton for a 4/10 stake at 2.20 with Coral
Back T.Un-Nooh to beat A.McManus for a 4/10 stake at 2.00 with Coral
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