The qualifying competition for the UK Championship continues on Tuesday when the third round of the event concludes over the course of three sessions and by the end of the day we will know the line up for the two Judgement Days.
The players ranked 17-48 are entering the competition at this stage and they will each face one of the players who came through in the second round looking for the win which will take them one win from an appearance in York.
Morning Session
Barry Hawkins is the highest ranked player on show in the morning session. The former top 16 regular will face Alfie Burden to get his latest UK Championship campaign underway. Ryan Day is another who has occupied the top 16 in the past and he starts out his tournament against Louis Heathcote. Scott Donaldson is another player beginning his campaign in the morning session. He will meet the women’s world champion Bai Yulu who is enjoying an excellent qualifying event so far. Wu Yize was a couple of balls away from winning the English Open earlier in the season and he opens up his UK campaign with a meeting with Ashley Carty while Yuan Sijun takes on Sanderson Lam. The other matches see Thepchaiya Un-Nooh facing David Lilley, Robbie Williams going up against Wang Yuchen and Joe O’Connor meeting Michael Holt.
Afternoon Session
Tom Ford has only recently dropped out of the top 16 and he’ll begin a qualifying campaign which could get him back in there when he competes as the highest ranked player in the afternoon session. He faces Lei Peifan but the pick of the matches in this session could be the one between Noppon Saengkham and Zhao Xintong or the other tasty looking tie between Zhou Yuelong and Marco Fu. The other leading light on show in this session is Dave Gilbert. He takes on Xing Zihao. Ben Woollaston and Joe Perry face off in another match. The other three matches see Matthew Selt playing Aaron Hill, Ricky Walden going up against Antoni Kowalski while Dominic Dale begins his final UK Championship campaign with a clash against Julien Leclercq.
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Evening Session
Neil Robertson has been in and out of the top 16 this season but he has chosen a bad time to drop out of it again which means that he has to go through qualifying if he is to make it into the UK Championship. Oliver Lines is the first man standing in his way. Robert Milkins will be looking to make it through to the final draw and he meets Ross Muir while Hossein Vafaei goes up against Ma Hailong. Pang Junxu is another leading light when he takes on Stan Moody. Xu Si had an excellent campaign in the International Championship and he’ll be looking to pick up where he left off when he meets Chris Totten. The other three matches see Anthony McGill playing He Guoqiang, Lyu Haotian taking on Liu Hongyu and Martin O’Donnell facing Matthew Stevens.
Betting
He Guoqiang looks to be a player very much on the up and I’m not completely sure that is the case with Anthony McGill so I quite like the Chinese player when that pair meet, not least because Guoqiang has already had a match this week on the tables, a match where he won 6-1 against Robbie McGuigan with breaks of 100, 99, 91, 102 and 86 so he was in excellent scoring form in that match and given that was on Monday there is no reason why he can’t pick up where he left off here.
McGill hasn’t really done a huge amount this season and in the main we only see his better efforts in the second half of a campaign and he trends towards his best when the World Championship is on the horizon and we’re not there yet. Guoqiang has had some wretched draws in recent times. The last three players to beat him have been Judd Trump, Luca Brecel and Ronnie O’Sullivan but the Chinese player has wins over O’Sullivan and Stephen Maguire on his CV this season. This is one of those progressive against regressing players matches and I always like the progressive one. It is He Guoqiang for me.
Tips
Back H.Guoqiang to beat A.McGill for a 3/10 stake at 2.50 with Coral
