The qualifying competition for the UK Championship gets underway on Saturday when the lowest ranked players in the field take to the baize in Wigan looking for the first of four wins which will seal their spot in the final stages of the first Triple Crown event of the year.
The first round of the tournament sees the players ranked 81 and below in the world rankings joined by the invited amateurs with six frames the number needed to make it through to the next stage of the competition.
Morning Session
There are eight matches in the morning session on Saturday with the highest ranked player in the first round on show first up when Huang Jiahao goes up against one of the many amateurs in the tournament in the form of Ethan Llewellyn. That will be one of four streamed matches in the session with the other three seeing Dylan Emery taking on Brian Cini, the Maltese amateur, Marco Fu taking on the female player Ng On Yee and the other woman in this session, Reanne Evans, meeting Peter Lines. The other four matches see Mateusz Baranowski playing Sahil Nayyar, Ian Burns going up against Amaan Iqbal, Chris Totten facing the New Zealand amateur Cody Turner and Hatem Yassen playing Oliver Brown.
Afternoon Session
Eight more matches take place in the afternoon session on Saturday where Liam Pullen is the highest ranked player on show. He is another who has an amateur to get the better of in the form of Kaylan Patel. The women’s world champion Bai Yulu is in action in this session too and she meets Mostafa Dorgham while Iulian Boiko faces the German amateur Umut Dikme. The other streamed match sees Steven Hallworth taking on Craig Steadman. There are four other matches in the session. The Hungarian player Bulcsu Revesz meets Chatchapong Nasa while Jonas Luz faces Connor Benzey with the other two games seeing Lan Yuhao playing a Jamie Clarke who is now an amateur in status while Ross Muir meets Fergal Quinn.
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Evening Session
Six more matches come along in the evening session where Ka Wai Cheung is the highest ranked player on show. He meets the Austrian player Florian Nuessle in a tough draw for both men. There are two other matches featuring two professionals as Michal Szubarczyk plays Jimmy White in a high profile match while Zhao Hanyang takes on Liam Graham. David Grace will be looking to make it through to the second round at the expense of the Brazilian amateur Igor Figueiredo and Xu Yuchen meets another former professional in Hammad Miah. Liu Wenwei will aim to reach the second round when he takes on the Polish amateur Krzysztof Czapnik in the other game.
Betting
I’ll ease my way into this qualifying competition but there is one that I like the look of. Lan Yuhao took a while to get going on the pro tour this season but that is understandable for a teenager coming over from China for the first time but he looks to have got the hang of it recently having had a decent run in Saudi Arabia, as well as qualifying for Northern Ireland, the International Championship and the Scottish Open. In the first two of those tournaments it took Chris Wakelin and Wu Yize to stop him.
He meets Jamie Clarke in the first round here which isn’t the easiest opponent, especially as Clarke won a Q-Tour event earlier in the month but I saw him in the 900 last month where he didn’t look particularly great and mentioned about how he has moved on with his own club and coaching and things. That might have changed since that Q-Tour event but this will be the first time since he dropped off the tour that he has played a pro event and he might need a few frames to get to grips with the conditions again. By then, Luhao could be away and gone. The teenager has already made six centuries this season including three breaks over 130 so he can score and I think he’s a decent price at odds against.
Tips
Back L.Yuhao to beat J.Clarke for a 3/10 stake at 2.05 with Betway
