The third day of the Players Championship sees the first round of the tournament conclude on Wednesday and the opening quarter final of the competition taking place on a big day in the second Players Series event of the season.
Four players will be looking to book their spot in the quarter final which comes on Friday afternoon and then two world champions will meet for a spot in the semi-final which takes place in the evening session on Friday.
Afternoon Session
John Higgins vs Chris Wakelin
The match on the main table on Wednesday afternoon sees the recently crowned World Open champion up against one of the remaining players left in the draw who is yet to win a title this season in the form of Chris Wakelin.
These sorts of events are second nature to Higgins and rejuvenated by his win in Yushan, he should come here with a lot of confidence and belief that he can reclaim the Players Championship crown, especially given that he has landed in a friendly quarter of the draw. That win in the World Open guaranteed he’ll be at the Tour Championship and seeded in the World Championship so he can focus on winning the title here. Wakelin doesn’t have that luxury. He has to reach at least the semi-final this week to have a chance of going to the Tour Championship and he also needs to win matches to be seeded at the Crucible so in many ways the pressure is on the outsider here, even though most people would expect Higgins to win. I expect Higgins to win too but Wakelin won 6-5 when the pair met in the International Championship earlier in the season so victory for the Scot isn’t guaranteed. I just think he’ll be much more comfortable in this setting but I’m in no rush to back him to cover a 2.5 frame handicap or bet the other way so I’ll leave this one alone.
Xiao Guodong vs Wu Yize
The last match over on table two this week is the one all-Chinese battle to take place as the Wuhan Open winner Xiao Guodong, already a finalist on ITV this season when he made the title match in the Champion of Champions, takes on Wu Yize, who has done everything but win a tournament this season.
Wu has been to the final of the English Open and the Scottish Open but you would have to say he fluffed his lines in both of those trophy tussles against Neil Robertson and Lei Peifan respectively, but that hasn’t detracted from anyone thinking that he won’t win a tournament and it might be an event like this where he knows he has to play well from start to finish. Wu is under pressure here as he is the one everyone is chasing for the final Tour Championship spot but he also knows if he can maintain his spot in that he has every chance of being seeded for the World Championship. Xiao Guodong is only just in the top 16 but the number of players outside who still have snooker left proper to the World Championship cut off is reducing by the day so he should be fine to reach Sheffield as a seed so he can focus on playing his best stuff here. If you take Judd Trump and Kyren Wilson out of the equation you could make a case for Xiao being the player of the season so far and he’ll look to stamp that authority on this match but we’ve seen all season that Wu Yize fears nobody and it was he who came out on top when these two met in the semi-final of the Scottish Open. Wu won that 6-4 but I don’t see him winning here, although I do expect him to put up as much of a challenge to Xiao as he did to him in Scotland. I think the even money on over 9.5 frames is perfectly reasonable here.
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Evening Session
Mark Williams vs Kyren Wilson
The opening quarter final of the Players Championship sees two tournament winners from the season going at it when the Champion of Champions winner Mark Williams goes up against the victor in the Xi’an Grand Prix, Northern Ireland Open and German Masters in Kyren Wilson.
The world champion Wilson is looking to build up a head of steam to take to Sheffield with him in just under five weeks and his win over Mark Allen in the opening round suggests he is on course to achieve that aim and it should continue against a Williams for whom the game is getting tough at the minute. I bet against Williams in the opening round but unfortunately for me, Ding Junhui had the mare of all mares, however throughout the match the Welshman was squinting, blinking lots and getting up and down on shots and he revealed afterwards that he is having issues with blurred vision. I would usually take that with a pinch of salt and suggest his ordinary performance was purely down to not practicing as much but having seen the extensive amount of pre-shot issues he was having I do think he was letting on with the truth in that interview. I would have expected Wilson to take care of Williams without too much fuss anyway because we know he is going to be pounding the practice table ready for his world title defence but when you add into the mix that Williams is having those problems and that equated to a pot success of barely 80% in the first round, then Wilson looks a good thing here. I’ll take him to cover the 1.5 frame handicap but this might be an opportunity for small bets on 6-0 and 6-1 to land.
Tips
Back X.Guodong vs W.Yize – Over 9.5 frames for a 3/10 stake at 2.00 with Betfair
Back K.Wilson (-1.5 frames) to beat M.Williams for a 5/10 stake at 1.95 with Betfred
Back K.Wilson to win 6-1 for a 1/10 stake at 13.00 with Unibet
Back K.Wilson to win 6-0 for a 0.5/10 stake at 29.00 with BetVictor
