There is a busy day for the 16 men remaining in the Indian Open snooker on Friday as the last 16 and the quarter finals of the tournament are played out and by the end of it we will know the four men who will fight it out for the title on Saturday.
With the big names mostly making it through to this stage of the tournament there should be some good action on the green baize on Friday with the last 16 taking place in the morning session before the quarter finals in the afternoon.
Thursday Recap
Thursday was another good day for us in the tournament with our sole match bet for the day coming through when Gary Wilson saw off Anthony Hamilton. That makes it five winners from five match bets in the tournament now.
If that wasn’t good enough both of out outrights came through on Thursday as well. Kyren Wilson came through despite being 3-0 down to Xiao Guodong. He won four on the spin to win 4-3 while Anthony McGill eased past Matthew Selt and will face Stuart Bingham on Friday.
Top Half
The last 16 has been split up into two sessions in the morning with the top half of the draw on the baize first followed by the second half. The matches first up are Gary Wilson against the surprise package from Thailand in Akani Songsermsawad. Kyren Wilson takes on Martin Gould in arguably the tie of the round while Peter Ebdon faces Dominic Dale and John Astley going up against Nigel Bond.
Bottom Half
The big names come out to play in the second set of matches. Shaun Murphy goes up against Oliver Lines while Rob Milkins takes on Mark Williams’ conqueror the amateur David Lilley. The other two matches are potential crackers as Barry Hawkins plays Stephen Maguire and Anthony McGill faces Stuart Bingham.
Betting
I’m going to go after two matches here and they both come up in the early session. Peter Ebdon is playing some nice stuff this week and at even money is a touch too big to see off Dominic Dale. Dale did have a great win against Marco Fu in the previous round but Fu was very disappointing.
Ebdon has a decent record against Dale overall and I don’t think that is a surprise. He is the better scorer of the two and he enjoys the scrappier frames a lot more. Given how well Ebdon is going at the minute I think he will come through there.
Nigel Bond is another who has beaten two good opponents in Ricky Walden and Sam Baird but John Astley has started the season really well with a quarter final in Riga where he ran into Mark Williams having earlier taken out Joe Perry and Jimmy Robertson and he has come through pretty solidly here too.
Astley saw off Ryan Day in the first round this week and that is a decent form guide so all things being equal I think he should be much more of a favourite than he currently is. I’ll take him to end Bond’s run here.
Tips
WON – Back P.Ebdon to beat D.Dale for a 4/10 stake at 2.00 with Coral
Back him here:
Back J.Astley to beat N.Bond for a 4/10 stake at 2.00 with Betfred
Back him here:
