It is quarter final day at the Shanghai Masters on Thursday with all four matches being played out across two sessions of play over in China as the opening invitation event of the season begins to head towards a conclusion.
We have had the odd shock over the course of the week but in the main we have eight very good players ready to battle it out for a place in the semi-finals which will take place on Friday and Saturday.
Afternoon Session
It is the bottom half of the draw where the action takes place in the afternoon session on Thursday which means that the pick of the matches will be the one between the former world champion Shaun Murphy and one of the four Chinese players left in the tournament in Zhou Yuelong. It is England against China in all four matches on Thursday as it goes and over on the other table we will have another former world champion on show when Mark Selby faces a Pang Junxu who came through a marathon clash on Wednesday.
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Evening Session
There is no doubt that the majority of the attention will be on the evening session on Thursday though where we have a couple of cracking matches to enjoy over the course of the few hours. The pick of the matches on the main table will be the latest meeting between the defending champion Ronnie O’Sullivan and the Chinese superstar Ding Junhui. Such is the quality on show in this session that the repeat of the German Masters final from earlier in the year between Judd Trump and Si Jiahui is only going to be on table two.
Betting
The odds look about right for this match but when you look through the previous meetings between Shaun Murphy and Zhou Yuelong, the Englishman tends to have the better of them and when he does he doesn’t just win but wins fairly comfortably and given how well Murphy got rid of John Higgins on Wednesday I think he might have too much for Zhou here. I have won twice backing Zhou this week and he has deserved both wins but I backed him in both matches because there were doubts over his opponent.
There are no doubts over Murphy now that we know that everything is fine with his cue and everything. Murphy made a 50+ break in every frame that he won against Higgins on Wednesday which is good scoring and while Zhou had three tons in a row against Barry Hawkins in the opening round, since then his scoring has dropped off a touch. Kyren Wilson was very poor against Zhou on Wednesday but I don’t believe Murphy will be that bad. I expect Murphy to win this around a 6-3 or 6-4 score so the even money on him to cover a 1.5 frame handicap looks good to me.
Tips
Back S.Murphy (-1.5 frames) to beat Z.Yuelong for a 3/10 stake at 2.00 with Betfair
