We already know that John Higgins is into the Tour Championship final and his opponent will be confirmed on Saturday when the second semi-final will be played out in Manchester as Mark Selby goes up against Ding Junhui.
Neither of these two men have made it through to the final of this competition in the past so one of them will be treading new territory. Both have shown good form this week though so this promises to be a tasty encounter.
Mark Selby
I think it is fair to say that Mark Selby struggled a touch in the opening round against Si Jiahui but the balls just didn’t go the way he wanted them to, however the British Open and Welsh Open winner certainly showed his best stuff in the quarter final when he absolutely demolished Neil Robertson 10-1 and if he has that sort of level with him here then he is going to be very tough to stop as he goes about landing the final tournament before the World Championship.
We know that Selby doesn’t have to score well to win snooker matches but when he does do it makes a huge difference so the three centuries and an 80 break that the Jester came up with is certainly a warning for his opposition. Selby is known to be better over the longer matches so he has every reason to be feeling really good about things, especially if he is just finding his way through the draw. If he has got improvement in him he will be a warm order here.
Ding Junhui
It is a little silly to say that Ding arrived at this tournament out of form when he has landed a huge title at the International Championship this season, but recent outings hadn’t been good from him so there was definitely a question or two for him to answer. He has done that with a welcome return to form which has seen him cruise past both Mark Williams and Kyren Wilson. He has won both matches easily and even more comfortably than the 10-5 score against the latter suggested.
Ding is back scoring well again and as a neutral that is always good to see because there are few in the game as good to watch as the Chinese superstar when he is cueing well and in and around the balls. He will know only too well that he needs to be aggressive here and take one or two risks because if this turns into a scrappy, tactical affair he is extremely likely to come out a distant second best. Therefore the long game of Ding will need to be in good order in this semi-final.
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Head-to-head
These two fine cueists have faced off on 27 previous occasions with Mark Selby having the edge but only by 14-13 overall. His lead is more dominant when it comes to the frame count though as he is 152-131 in front in that regard which suggests that when he wins he does so fairly comfortably. This will be the first time that the pair will face off at the Tour Championship but they have met twice over the best of 19 frames, with each winning one of the previous two. This will be the fourth time they have faced off in a semi-final with Selby having come out on top in three of the previous four so the past meetings edge is with the Englishman but maybe not as emphatically as many would expect.
Betting
There is no doubt that Ding Junhui has improved this week but I’m not sure he has improved enough to beat this version of Mark Selby. Selby is scoring well and that always spells danger to the rest of the field for me, especially over this sort of distance. We know that he has a massive advantage in the tactical department and that is very much a positive to his chances here because I can’t believe Ding will want to get involved in all of that.
To be fair to Ding, he has played well this week but there is an element that neither of his opponents have shown up against him. Mark Williams has been having issues with his eyes while Kyren Wilson was suffering with nose bleeds and things in the opening session of their quarter final. Selby has no such issues that we know about and I expect him to win this. We haven’t seen many close matches this week and there is nothing to suggest this will go to the wire so I’m happy to take Selby to cover a 1.5 frame start.
Tips
Back M.Selby (-1.5 frames) to beat D.Junhui for a 3/10 stake at 1.85 with Unibet
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