As is the tradition, the opening match of The Masters sees the defending champion begin his title defence which means that Yan Bingtao is the first man onto the baize inside Alexandra Palace on Sunday. He faces the former champion Mark Williams for a quarter final spot.
Bingtao won this tournament behind closed doors in Milton Keynes last year but will be making his Alexandra Palace debut. Williams is a regular in this arena and will know exactly what it is all about in what should be a great way to start the tournament.
Yan Bingtao
We are going to find out a lot about Yan Bingtao in this match. He performed admirably to win the tournament last year but he’ll defend in very different surroundings. London crowds are pretty vocal and the Chinese star won’t have played in front of a crowd of more than 2,000 punters very often so he’ll need to make sure he starts well and settles down early else this match could get away from him. I believe Bingtao is a big occasion performer but we’ll find out for sure if that is the case here.
Bingtao has had a good season up to this point. He was a semi-finalist at the Northern Ireland Open and the Champion of Champions as well as quarter finals at the English Open and the World Grand Prix so the Chinese number one has certainly been a consistent performer. He has a good all round game but you would have thought he would need to score well to come through here because he’s unlikely to outscrap Williams.
Mark Williams
Whenever I think of Mark Williams at The Masters my mind heads back to that amazing final with Stephen Hendry going on 25 years ago. He knows exactly what to expect in this tournament and the one thing you know is that because of his laid back nature the daunting size of the crowd is going to have little to no impression on him. Assuming he is fully fit after his battle with Covid a couple of months ago he is entitled to put down a real challenge here.
Williams comes to Alexandra Palace having won a title this season when he landed the British Open and he has generally been playing well all season even if his results don’t necessarily reflect that. He has only won one match in his last six visits to this tournament which is a concern but he hasn’t come here with the confidence of a title under his belt very often and a couple of those losses were agonising ones to big players.
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Head to Head
These two have met on four previous occasions in their career and it is Williams who has a 3-1 lead, although the win which Bingtao managed came in the 6-red tournament so it is 3-0 in ‘traditional’ snooker. That is reflected in the frame totals where Williams is 23-17 ahead or 19-11 if you go by just their 15 red stuff. That confirms the dominance nicely. They have played one final together in the past when Williams beat Yan in the 2017 Northern Ireland Open final and he won their only Last 16 meeting against each other at the Players Championship in 2018 when a 6-2 success saw him make progress. History is on the side of the Welshman here.
Betting
I’ve backed Mark Williams outright but I can’t avoid backing him again here. I’m not surprised that he has such a good record over Yan Bingtao. He does much the same things as what the Chinese star does but he does most things just that little bit better and as long as he is fit and healthy, and there is nothing to suggest he isn’t, then I think he will keep up his perfect 15 red record against the youngster and end his title defence at the first hurdle.
Bingtao is treading new territory here. He has defended titles before but never one with the prestige of this one and he has never played a match at Alexandra Palace and the size of the crowd makes it much bigger than anything he will have witnessed before. I’m not saying he’ll completely freeze but he might not be completely comfortable at the same time. Williams will be and I think his experience will prove crucial in this one.
Tips
WON – Back M.Williams to beat Y.Bingtao for a 3/10 stake at 2.20 with Betfair
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