The penultimate day of qualifying for the Northern Ireland Open takes place in Wigan on Saturday when we have another 16 players taking to the baize all looking for the four frames they need to make it through to the first Home Nations event of the season.
We have a mixture of new blood, big names and seasoned campaigners taking to the baize on Saturday on a day where we should see some competitive matches but perhaps the odd one-sided one as well.
Morning Session
We go back to the familiar move of Chinese players getting stuck into the morning session on Saturday. The two on show in this session are Pang Junxu and Peng Yisong. The former started the season very well and he has an amateur to take care of in the form of Steven Hallworth. Peng is getting his professional career underway in the early part of this season but has a stiff task against Anthony McGill to overcome to make it into the main draw.
Early Afternoon Session
Elliot Slessor is the highest ranked player who is on show in the first of the afternoon sessions. He had a good run in the British Open last season and if he is going to start another in the Northern Ireland Open then he will need to get the better of Zhang Jiankang. Stuart Carrington is the other established player on show in this session. He goes up against the Belgian player Julien Leclerq for a place in the main draw.
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Later Afternoon Session
The pick of the sessions on Saturday is the third one of the day where the Welsh Open champion Joe Perry will be the star attraction on show. He meets one of the finest players to come out on Wales in the form of Matthew Stevens in what is probably the match of the day. Oliver Lines hasn’t started this season as emphatically as he did the last one. He will go up against the former champion in Belfast in Mark King for a spot in the main draw.
Evening Session
Matthew Selt is the top ranked player in the evening session and he’ll be looking for a first win of the season to get his campaign up and running. If he is to get that victory he will need to overcome Duane Jones who has shown signs of improvement this term. There is a Welsh player involved in the other game now too because Daniel Wells has got into the draw after Asjad Iqbal withdrew. He is rewarded with a clash against Adam Duffy.
Betting
I think it is fair to say that neither Oliver Lines nor Mark King have had a particularly inspiring beginning to the season but one of them is going to win when they meet in the second of the afternoon sessions and I believe that will be Lines. King might be motivated to win this match because it would get him back to a tournament he has won previously but I’m a big believer in the younger man beating the fading one in these qualifying matches.
While Lines has only won one match this season, he did beat Tom Ford in it and that isn’t a terrible result by any means. He has generally scored well throughout his matches but run into some insane performances. I’m not convinced he is going to run into any of them here because King has made two 50 breaks in five matches this season and his only win came against Fergal O’Brien in the Championship League. You have to score in the modern game and Lines is much better at it and I think that will give him enough of an edge to get the win here.
Tips
Back O.Lines to beat M.King for a 3/10 stake at 1.91 with William Hill
Back him here:
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