It is the last 16 day at the German Masters on Thursday with the entire round taking place across three sessions of play as we get closer to whittling the arena down to the one-table setup for what is often one of the best weekends of the snooker season.
We saw a number of shocks on Wednesday with the likes of Mark Allen and Mark Selby among the players to fall by the wayside so the bigger names who are left in will certainly be on their toes to avoid being the latest high profile casualty.
Morning Session
There are only two matches taking place in the morning session on Thursday with the UK Championship finalist Barry Hawkins being the highest ranked player on show. That means he will be on the TV match when he takes on Ricky Walden in what should be a decent match. Two men who took care of top 16 players in the previous round will meet in one of the outside tables when Alexander Ursenbacher looks to back up his wins over Jack Lisowski and Ali Carter when he takes on Wu Yize, who got rid of Mark Allen on Wednesday.
Afternoon Session
The highlight of the three matches in the afternoon session on Thursday will be on the TV table and is a repeat of the World Championship final as the winner of that Crucible showpiece Kyren Wilson takes on the man who he beat for the title in Jak Jones. Zhang Anda has made his way through to the last 16 and he’ll look to book his spot in another ranking event quarter final when he takes on the former World Championship semi-finalist Anthony McGill while the other match sees the Wuhan Open winner Xiao Guodong looking for yet another last eight appearance in a standout season for him. Elliot Slessor stands in his way.
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Evening Session
We probably save the best for last in terms of sessions on Thursday because the match on the main table sees Judd Trump continuing his title defence when he takes on the English Open winner Neil Robertson in comfortably the pick of the matches on the day. Such is the quality on show in the evening session, The Masters champion Shaun Murphy will only be on one of the outside tables for his clash with Yuan Sijun. Two men who are outside the top 16 but will be looking to keep their ranking going in the right direction also do battle in this session when the Shootout winner Tom Ford goes up against the Irish player Aaron Hill.
Betting
There are one or two on the schedule on Thursday that I thought about backing but when I did the deeper dive into it that I do before I pull the trigger I just didn’t quite have the confidence that I thought I would so there is one bet for me over the course of the day and that comes in the match between Xiao Guodong and Elliot Slessor, a match I expect to see the Chinese player come out on top in and continue his fine campaign so far.
Slessor is undoubtedly improving as a player and is consistently getting to this stage of a tournament but he didn’t make a single 50 break in beating Mark Selby in a late night clash on Wednesday whereas Guodong had his feet up having played in the morning session. Guodong outlasted Si Jiahui and has played well this week. To be fair to him, he has played well for the last three or four months, combining top quality safety with heavy scoring. Slessor can mix it with many but Guodong is third on the one-year list for a reason and I expect him to show that here.
Tips
Back X.Guodong (-1.5 frames) to beat E.Slessor for a 3/10 stake at 1.80 with Boylesports
Back him here: