The second Home Nations event of the season takes place this week when the leading lights in the snooker world head to the Waterfront Hall in Belfast for the Northern Ireland Open, one of the better tournaments on the circuit.
It was certainly one of the better ones for Judd Trump last year as he took the title down and he will be back in Northern Ireland looking to defend his crown in what looks to be a decent enough field with the change in qualifying format.
Recent Winners
2023 – Judd Trump
2022 – Mark Allen
2021 – Mark Allen
2020 – Judd Trump
2019 – Judd Trump
2018 – Judd Trump
2017 – Mark Williams
2016 – Mark King
The Format
The format for the Home Nations events has changed this year. The top 32 players in the rankings have bypassed the qualifying competition and will face one of the qualifiers in the first round of the event. The draw is in order of the rankings and is a straight knockout. The first round through to the last 16 are the best of seven frames while the quarter finals take place on Friday over the best of nine frames. The two semi-finals are the best of 11 frames and the Alex Higgins Trophy will be won over the best of 17 frames in the Sunday final. The winner pockets £100,000.
Top Quarter
As the defending champion, Judd Trump is at the top of the draw bracket and the world number one is in the top quarter as a result of that. We know that all members of the top 16 are in the draw this week and if Trump makes it to the quarter final and it goes with the seedings then he will meet Shaun Murphy when he gets there. Gary Wilson is no stranger to winning Home Nations events and he is in this top quarter as well while John Higgins is the other player in the elite band in this quarter.
Barry Hawkins has dropped out of the top 16 and he’ll be looking to use this week to try and climb back into it. Stuart Bingham is another who could improve his top 16 hopes from this quarter as is Zhou Yuelong while also in this quarter is the English Open semi-finalist Ishpreet Singh Chadha, Fan Zhengyi who has been showing some decent signs recently, Matthew Selt, Lyu Haotian and the Welsh pair of Matthew Stevens and Dominic Dale.
Second Quarter
Ronnie O’Sullivan is due to be the leading light in the second quarter of the draw but there are strong rumours that he is going to pull out of the event which would leave Mark Selby with a smoother path through to the semi-final. Were O’Sullivan not to turn up another man who could potentially benefit is Tom Ford. He is one of the other top 16 players in the section with the Wuhan Open finalist Si Jiahui the other one.
This could be a big week for the likes of Dave Gilbert and Robert Milkins who could close back into a return to the top 16 if they can have a big week. Xiao Guodong is here looking to make it like London buses in terms of titles after he won the Wuhan Open last week. Other players of note in the quarter include the home favourite Jordan Brown, Jimmy Robertson, Joe O’Connor, Elliot Slessor and the Wuhan semi-finalist Long Zehuang.
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Third Quarter
The home crowds will have their eyes on the third quarter of the draw as it is where their superstar and former champion Mark Allen is housed as he looks to win his national title for a third time. If he is to do that he might need to go through the 2023 world champion Luca Brecel who really needs a deep run in a tournament at some point. Neil Robertson is also in this quarter looking to win successive Home Nations titles having won the English Open last month while Zhang Anda is the other top 16 player in this section.
Jack Lisowski made it through to the quarter final of the Wuhan Open last week and he will look to go well from this section while the English Open finalist Wu Yize is in what has to be described as the toughest section of the draw. Hossein Vafaei and Pang Junxu are two players who are more than capable of going deep in any tournament while Ricky Walden, Graeme Dott and Jimmy White are veterans looking for a big week.
Bottom Quarter
It is from the bottom quarter where the world champion Kyren Wilson will go in search of a second title on the season from. He won the Xi’an Grand Prix earlier in the campaign and will want a first Northern Ireland success here. His potential quarter final opponent is Mark Williams but a look on his Twitter feed will tell you he has been in China in the last week so how he will be remains to be seen. Ali Carter is another top 16 player in this quarter while Jak Jones is the other one.
Ryan Day and the English Open semi-finalist Chris Wakelin, who made the final here a year ago, are the two big threats from the players ranked outside the top 16 in this quarter although Stephen Maguire and Anthony McGill might have something to say about that. The two leading Thai players Noppon Saengkham and Thepchaiya Un-Nooh are both in this quarter as are Jamie Clarke, Stan Moody and Alexander Ursenbacher.
Betting
Ali Carter looks to have landed himself in a decent part of the draw for this tournament. There is no guarantee that Mark Williams, who would be his last 16 opponent, turns up in any kind of nick having been in China and Kyren Wilson wouldn’t be a quarter final opposition that he would fear. Carter looked like he was getting into a decent position in the Wuhan Open but went down in a deciding frame to Shaun Murphy but there is nothing to suggest that he isn’t playing well and at 25/1 I think there is plenty of juice in his price given the open draw he looks to have had.
Elliot Slessor feels like a massive price at 200/1 as well. He has reached the last 16 of the Saudi Masters where he had Ali Carter and Zhou Yuelong among his victims while he took care of Kyren Wilson on his way to the quarter final of the English Open. We have seen him in the semi-final of ranking events in the past and we’ve also seen players in the 20-40 ranking in the game reaching finals all season long with Xiao Guodong, Wu Yize, Si Jiahui and Neil Robertson doing it in the last three events while Jak Jones did it at the World Championship. Slessor is an improving player and if Ronnie O’Sullivan doesn’t show up then the Geordie could easily go far here.
Tips
Back A.Carter to win Northern Ireland Open (e/w) for a 1.5/10 stake at 26.00 with Coral (1/2 1-2)
Back E.Slessor to win Northern Ireland Open (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 201.00 with Coral (1/2 1-2)
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