The World Grand Prix opens up the Players Series on Tuesday when half of the first round gets played out on what looks to be an excellent day of snooker out in Hong Kong with plenty on the line for the 16 players who are involved.
The beauty of this tournament is that it is the 32 leading money earners on the one-year list that is involved so we have form horses everywhere we look and that is very much the case on Tuesday where the top two players in the world are on show.
Early Session
We have two tables in operation in this tournament and two sets of matches in each session. Mark Williams will be first up on the main table when he looks to make it into the last 16 at the expense of the former world champion Stuart Bingham while over on the other table we have a massive clash between Jack Lisowski and Zhang Anda. They are just outside the top 16 in the one-year rankings and only one of them will have a chance of progressing through to the Players Championship.
The Masters champion Shaun Murphy will be the headline act on the main table in the second part of the earlier session. He was due to be facing Stephen Maguire in the opening round but he pulled out on the eve of the event and so it is Ben Woollaston who will take on ‘The Magician’. The other match in the first part of the day sees the former Shootout winner Chris Wakelin going up against Dave Gilbert with the latter needing a huge week to make it into the Players Championship.
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Later Session
It is all about the top two in the world in the later part of the day. The world number one and top seed Judd Trump will be first onto the main table in the second session. He will face off against statistically the last qualifier in the draw in Gary Wilson while over on the other table there is a clash between the recently crowned World Open winner John Higgins and the man who made the semi-final of that event and the Welsh Open which preceded it in Ali Carter. The win last week ensured Higgins will be at the Tour Championship but Carter is in the final spot in the Players Championship beginning the week and he needs to win this match else he is a sitting duck.
The second part of the later session will see the world champion Kyren Wilson looking to make it into the last 16. He goes up against the second to last automatic qualifier for the tournament in the shape of Matthew Selt while on the other table we have two Chinese players battling it out for a spot in the second round when Pang Junxu looks to back up a solid effort in the World Open last week when he takes on one of the players of the season so far in the rising star Wu Yize.
Betting
I wouldn’t ever suggest that John Higgins wouldn’t want to win a match but there has to be a bit of a comedown from winning his first tournament in four years at the weekend, not least the mental reserves he would have used up. What that win last week did do is ensure he will be in the Players Championship and the Tour Championship so he might lack the motivation to go well here that Ali Carter has given that Carter has work to do here if he is going to be in the Players Championship.
Carter has also been in decent form in recent times having made the semi-final of the last two tournaments and he also has a good record against Higgins having won their last five matches away from the Championship League, with the latest three of those wins coming over this format. I suspect we might see a slightly below par Higgins here with all the travelling and efforts he’s been putting in and Carter looks a decent enough price to take advantage.
Tips
Back A.Carter to beat J.Higgins for a 3/10 stake at 2.40 with Betfred
