The second day of the Players Championship sees four more matches taking place across two sessions of action as we get closer to completing the quarter final line up in the second of the three Players Series events.
Of the eight players on show over the course of Tuesday we have six who have graced a World Championship final with five of them having landed the big one in Sheffield so we should expect the quality to be very high.
Afternoon Session
Neil Robertson vs Stuart Bingham
The action on the main table in the afternoon session on Tuesday will offer up a repeat of the recent World Grand Prix final as Neil Robertson looks for an identical result to the one he had in Hong Kong when he meets Stuart Bingham.
Bingham won’t need reminding that he lost that final 10-0 but he did let us into the fact that he lost a family member on the morning of that match and he was on the other side of the world so that would have been a difficult thing to overcome and it showed. Robertson was pretty relentless though to be fair and in truth it might not have made a difference. I don’t think we could say that the Australian would have won 10-0 had the Bingham mind been fully on the job but I do still think he would have won that final. I would expect Bingham to put up a much better challenge here though for a couple of reasons. The first one is presumably he will be in a better head space and secondly he’ll be fuelled by motivation. He’ll want revenge for that final, he knows he needs to reach the final to have a chance of making the Tour Championship and also this is a first round match so both come in here cold so to speak. You can get odds against on over 9.5 frames in this one and given everything around this match that looks a good bet to me. Bingham played well in Hong Kong prior to that final and he can put up a challenge here.
Mark Selby vs Si Jiahui
Such is the quality on show in this tournament, the match on the other table on Tuesday afternoon sees a player who has won two titles this season in Mark Selby going up against one of the most promising players from China in Si Jiahui.
There is no doubt that Si Jiahui is dangerous on his day and he is more than capable of beating anyone in the game but those days have been few and far between since he made the final of the Wuhan Open and you would have to think that Selby, who has been in decent form in recent times having landed the Welsh Open title last month, is a worthy favourite here. Whether you want to back him at a restrictive price against a player who can be dangerous on any given day is another question but I certainly wouldn’t want to be opposing Selby in the current form. He is a little short for me though so I’ll leave this one alone.
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Evening Session
Judd Trump vs Lei Peifan
The action on the main table in the evening session will see the number one seed and world number one Judd Trump beginning his quest to get his hands on a first title in 2025 when he goes up against the man who lifted the last ranking trophy in 2024 in Lei Peifan.
Peifan has already done very well to make it through to this stage of the season given where he was in the rankings prior to winning the Scottish Open and you get the impression that he is on a free roll here, or playing with the house money at the very least. Peifan had a good opening half of the season but since he won that Scottish Open things have gone a little on the quiet side. That isn’t the case with Trump. He reached the semi-finals of the World Grand Prix and will now be looking to hit top form again as the World Championship approaches. I can’t see past Trump here but we’re at the stage of the season where I don’t really want to be on big handicaps so I’ll skip this one too.
Barry Hawkins vs Shaun Murphy
The pick of the matches on paper on Tuesday is the one which features two men who have made Triple Crown finals this season when the UK Championship finalist Barry Hawkins goes up against The Masters champion Shaun Murphy in what looks a cracker.
Murphy is arguably playing the snooker of his life and he is defending some big money this week having won the title a couple of years ago so he’ll be keen to go a couple of steps further than he managed in the World Grand Prix where he was 5-3 up against Neil Robertson only to lose 6-5. Hawkins has made the German Masters final and the quarter final of the World Open since he made the UK final but significantly he lost to Murphy at the World Grand Prix a couple of weeks ago. You would imagine Hawkins will be more at it over the longer format and he can certainly beat anyone at the minute but Murphy is right on the top of his game. You can easily make a case for 7/5 being big on Hawkins, he’s that good, but I don’t think he wins this so I’ll give this one a miss as Murphy is only a correct price rather than anything that stands out.
Tips
Back N.Robertson vs S.Bingham – Over 9.5 frames for a 3/10 stake at 2.10 with Betfair
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