The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Higgins closes in on semi-final place at the Crucible as Ding leads O’Sullivan
WORLD: Scot in control of last-eight meeting with Wilson
John Higgins moved to the brink of the Betfred World Championship semifinals as he looked to have broken the challenge of Kyren Wilson in Sheffield.
Wilson had levelled from 2-0 down in the morning, helped by a 92 break, but damaged his cue tip and, after a brief stoppage for repairs, saw four-time Crucible champion Higgins open up a 5-3 lead with breaks of 62 and 59.
The Scot began the evening with a 129 and, after the next two were shared, added breaks of 74 and 135 either side of the interval to lead 9-4.
Wilson responded well with a 97 – the spirit shown by the ‘Warrior’ would have impressed watching former England footballer Paul Ince – but Higgins won the last two to leave himself two frames from victory at 11-5 when the match resumes this morning.
Ding Junhui produced a sparkling display to lead Ronnie O’Sullivan 10-6 in their quarter-final.
Every frame of the morning saw a break of 50 or more, Ding taking a 3-0 lead before O’Sullivan levelled the session at 4-4, but the Chinese player pulled ahead in the evening session.
Ding opened with a 71 break and followed up with a magnificent 128 clearance to double his advantage. It got better for the world No 4 as another run of 71 put him further ahead.
But O’Sullivan hit back with a 63 to finally get on the scoreboard before the interval and took the next two after the restart with runs of 99 and 65 to level.
Ding scraped the next on a respotted black despite a 69 break from the fivetime champion, who finished off with a run of 59 to restore parity.
The pattern continued into the evening as Ding returned with a framewinning 63 clearance in frame nine.
O’Sullivan came from behind to win the next but was unable to repeat the dose in frame 11 after over-running a positional shot to the black.
Ding took that one and made it 7-5 at the interval. He then resumed with a 120 break and went on to stretch his lead to 10-5 with a 58 in frame 15.
O’Sullivan, though, produced a defiant rapid-fire 104 in the final frame to give himself a chance today.
Reigning champion Mark Selby was also on course for a place in the semifinals after storming into a 6-2 lead over Marco Fu in the afternoon session, reeling off the first five frames before Fu gave himself a glimmer of hope.
World No 1 Selby took advantage of the weary-looking Hong Kong player, who got through with a 13-11 win against Neil Robertson in a late finish on Monday, by racing out of the blocks.
Scot Stephen Maguire won the first frame against Barry Hawkins but would ultimately be relieved to trail just 5-3.
After Maguire’s opening 81, runs of 46 and 98 helped Hawkins move 3-1 ahead at the interval and the lead became 5-1.
The Scot stopped Hawkins’ five-frame winning run by stealing a tight seventh frame on the black, having needed snookers, and crucially also won the last frame of the afternoon.