Lisowski fails to make final

DING Junhui was taking on Mark Allen in the final of the UK Snooker Championship last night after the Northern Irishman produced a thrilling comeback to beat Gloucesershire’s Jack Lisowski in Saturday’s semi-final.

Three-time champion Ding reached his fourth final after a 6-3 victory over Tom Ford at the Barbican in York.

Ding had dished out a 6-0 thrashing to Ronnie O’Sullivan in the quarter-finals as the world number one suffered a first whitewash in a Triple Crown event in his 30-year career.

To get to last night’s final, Allen had to produce a stirring comeback to defeat Lisowski 6-5 in Saturday’s late match.

Lisowski had made four centuries in a row as he defeated Shaun Murphy in the previous round, and two half-century runs helped him open up a 2-0 lead. Allen edged the third frame before a break of 63 levelled the match heading into the mid-session interval. After exchanging frames following the restart, Lisowski capitalised when Allen missed a long pot to move 4-3 ahead and then closed out the next frame to move within sight of victory.

Allen, though, fought back to force a decider, which he won.

Afterwards, Allen told BBC Sport: “I have no idea (how I won), that was awful.”