Curtis-Barrett fights hard - but Ding triumphs
JAMIE Curtis-Barrett’s UK Championship hopes were dashed at the first hurdle as he fell to a 6-1 defeat against world No.10 Ding Junhui. Grimsby’s Curtis-Barrett, currently an amateur after falling off the professional tour, battled admirably in Milton Keynes but was unable to halt the experienced 14-time ranking event winner booking his place in the last 64.
The 36-year-old came into the event bidding to better his first round exits suffered in 2016 and 2017 but succumbed to the same fate as two half-century breaks from the Chinese player thwarted his advances.
Ding, a three-time UK champion who won the event last year at the York Barbican, raced into a 3-0 lead as a second frame break of 65 left Curtis-Barrett slumped in his chair. The Lincolnshire player showed signs of fighting spirit in the fourth, however, racking up 68 points to narrow the deficit under the Marshall Arena lights.
But the Ding train just kept on rolling after the interval as a fluent visit of 130 in the sixth frame helped fire him to a convincing win to kick off his title defence. Curtis-Barrett is yet to progress beyond the second round of a ranking event, reaching the second stage of the Gibraltar Open, Scottish
Open and Northern Ireland Open in the 2017-18 season but unable to emulate those exploits at the UK Championship.
The tournament, one of snooker’s three Triple Crown events alongside the World Championship and Masters, is taking place at Milton Keynes’ behind closed doors Marshall Arena rather than its usual York location as snooker continues to adapt to coronavirus restrictions.
Curtis-Barrett has reached the last 64 of a ranking event on seven occasions but is still waiting for his maiden run of note in one of the sport’s major events.
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