The bottom half of the Tour Championship draw gets up and running on Monday when two more players who have had stellar campaigns battle it out over the best of 17 frames for a spot in the semi-finals at the Marshall Arena in Milton Keynes.
English and Scottish Open winner Mark Selby takes on Yan Bingtao, the man who opened up the season with a win in the Riga Masters before making the final of the Players Championship earlier in the campaign.
The Format
There are only seven matches in this tournament with the quarter finals and semi-finals being played over two sessions of action and the best-of-17 frames. The final was due to be the only match of the season outside of the World Championship to be the best-of-25 frames with the winner being crowned over three sessions, however the social distancing and health measures that are in place mean that the final on Friday will just be the best of 19 frames.
Mark Selby
There was a time not too long ago when Mark Selby would turn up to a long distance format event like this and be almost impossible to beat. Those times are in the past but when he is at his best he can still be a formidable opponent, especially if the match requires a lot of safety battles. He has however shown this season that he can hit the ground running and dominate opponents. When he won the English Open he walloped Dave Gilbert 9-1 and he dominated Jack Lisowski to win the Scottish Open 9-6.
If there is one real area of concern for Mark Selby fans it would be that he generally needs to be competitively sharp to be at his best, hence why he enters most of the events he can. He probably can’t be sharp at the minute, even allowing for a pretty average stint in the Championship League, so followers of the Jester will be hoping two weeks of practice has sharpened his game up a little. It will have needed to though.
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Yan Bingtao
This has been a breakthrough season for the exceptionally talented and likeable Chinese star Yan Bingtao. Winning any tournament is a big deal but the way he broke his duck in Riga this time last year was very impressive. Although he offered no obstacle to Judd Trump in the final of the Players Championship, he played some brilliant snooker to get there and showed all his bottle. He also made the semi-final of the UK Championship and the Welsh Open so this has been a good term for the 20-year-old.
The one thing we have seen from Bingtao has the season has gone on is a much more rounded tactical game. He isn’t afraid to mix it in the safety department and when he does it well he is very dangerous because he can score with the best of them. There is a potential rustiness issue here given that he gave the Championship League a swerve, but there was probably that in Riga at the start of the season and he ran away with the title there.
Head to Head
These two have met on two previous occasions but they were both over the best of seven distance so what we can take from them is open to debate. The one thing we can draw from them is that they both have a comfortable win apiece so there isn’t going to be any fear on the part of Bingtao going into this match that is for sure. Bingtao beat Selby 4-1 in the Welsh Open in 2017 while Selby saw off Bingtao without dropping a frame in the Champion of Champions earlier in the season. This is a different thing entirely though.
Betting
I have to say I like Yan Bingtao here. I liked him when this tournament was due to go and nothing has changed in that regard. If we were in an ideal world he would have shown up at the Championship League and got the competitive rust out of his system, but if there is one thing we know about this Chinese ace it is that he is a relentless practicer and he plays at an academy with some fine players so I would expect he will have had a game against someone.
Mark Selby looked right off his game in the Championship League and I don’t think he can win this if he isn’t much closer to his best. If both play well Selby might just have the edge but I don’t think it is as big as one as the odds suggest. When Bingtao showed all his bottle at the Players Championship, he went up a level in my eyes and should be a leading player now. These kind of events with crowds and big build ups might still be a little above him at this stage of his career but given this will feel like a glorified practice session I’ll take the Chinese at around the 7/4 mark.
Tips
Back Y.Bingtao to beat M.Selby for a 3/10 stake at 2.75 with Coral
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