Home defeat Lisowski falls at the first hurdle
GLOUCESTERSHIRE snooker star Jack Lisowski suffered a 4-1 first round World Grand Prix defeat at the Centaur as Ding Junhui who celebrated Chinese New Year in style.
Former Chosen Hill School pupil Lisowski, playing in his home event at Cheltenham Racecourse, won the opening frame of the match but Ding quickly built momentum with high breaks of 88 and a 126.
Ding, 31, finished the match in under an hour and scored 349 points without reply as he beat Lisowski for the second time within a month after his win over the Churchdown man at the Masters.
China’s hero will go on to play either David Gilbert or Yan Bingtao in the last 16.
Home favourite Lisowski will have to wait a week until his next match in the Welsh Open, where he starts against Niu Zhuang next Monday.
“I think I’m going to go somewhere now, have a few days off I need to get away from it and come back fresh and I think it’s kind of getting to me a bit.
I’ve just got to try and regroup now because there’s a lot coming up and get my act together”, Lisowski said after a disappointing night.
Lisowski started the match on the front foot by winning the opening frame within 13 minutes.
Ding needed three attempts to level the match but recorded a break of 52 to make it 1-1.
He creatively opened the cluster of reds to produce a solid break of 88 in the third frame.
Lisowski, ranked 16 in the world, then played a poor safety shot in the early stages of the fourth frame.
Ding failed to capitalize, but was more clinical with his second chance.
A solid 126 moved him within one frame of victory and his dominance rolled on as he extended his points without reply tally to 349 points to clinch the match.
Judd Trump survived a scare to make it through to the last 16 with a 4-3 win over Stuart Carrington.
The 29-year-old raced into a 3-0 lead, which included breaks of 92 and 122, but Carrington won the next three to send the match into a decider.
Trump goes onto face Tom Ford after he beat Joe Perry 4-3 while Stephen Maguire had a convincing 4-1 victory over Mark King.
Ford scraped past Perry in a match he led four times and remained calm in the final frame to seal the win.