The Northern Ireland Open is beginning to settle down a little in terms of the number of matches in a day but on Thursday those who make it that far will need to play two games as the tournament goes from the last 32 down to the quarter finals in one go.
The afternoon session on Thursday sees the last 32 played out in Belfast and then the winners come straight back in the evening for the last 16 to set up the last three rounds over the weekend. Due to time restrictions we won’t be able to bet on the last 16 but we can get stuck into the last 32.
Opening Matches
There are eight matches in this little session with the TV tables being filled by the matches between Zhou Yuelong and the maximum man from Wednesday, John Higgins as well as the Mark Williams and Dave Gilbert match.
On the outside tables we have Peter Ebdon taking on Scott Donaldson, Sanderson Lam plays Hossein Vafaei Ayouri while Kurt Maflin meets Josh Boileau. Mark King and Fergal O’Brien do battle and there are a couple of appealing matches between Luca Brecel and Michael White along with Ricky Walden and Dominic Dale.
Middle Matches
We have six in this mini-session with the pick of them being Ronnie O’Sullivan against Zhang Anda which will be on a TV table with the other main table likely to contain Jack Lisowski and Joe Perry.
On the outside tables Kyren Wilson plays Akani Songsermsawad while Fraser Patrick takes on Barry Hawkins. There is a battle of the Anthony’s as Hamilton faces McGill and Yan Bingtao plays Robbie Williams.
Later Matches
The round of fixtures finishes off with two more matches which are both on the main tables. Mark Allen will take on Robin Hull on the TV table while on the streamed table we will get Sam Baird taking on Gary Wilson.
Betting
We’ve had a little bit of time to get a feel for the tournament now and it was nice to pick up three winners from three bets on Wednesday and I’m taking two bets in this round to hopefully back those winners up with.
Sanderson Lam has been firing in the breaks in this tournament and you don’t beat Alan McManus 4-0 if you can’t play the game so he should be feeling very good about life at the minute. He now takes on the Iranian player Hossein Vafaei Ayouri who in fairness has done ok himself this week. Both are hitting rarefied air in terms of this stage of a tournament in their career but the player playing better is Lam and that can carry him to victory.
Two men who had to come through deciding frame wins on Wednesday were Sam Baird and Gary Wilson and they meet each other on Thursday. I took Wilson on Wednesday and he did the business for me but I think he’s a perfect match up for Baird and as such I think it will be Baird who comes through here. Baird took care of Marco Fu on Wednesday and I fancy he’ll follow that up with another win here.
Tips
Back S.Lam to beat H-V.Ayouri for a 4/10 stake at 2.25 with Betfred
Back him here:
Back S.Baird to beat G.Wilson for a 4/10 stake at 1.91 with Paddy Power
Back him here:
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