China Open Day 3

Barry Hawkins disappointed the crowd of the Beijing Universty
Sportshall by defeating Ding Junhui 5-3. Imgae: Sky Sports

Fan’s favourite Ding Junhui was dumped out of the China Open as he was defeated 5-3 by Barry Hawkins. Ding has been playing well of late after winning the PTC Grand Finals a week ago but his poor run in China repeated itself as he fell at the first hurdle. He started the match dismally, losing the first four frames as Hawkins hit top breaks of 67 and 108. Ding did start a min-revival by taking the next three, including top runs of 64 and 53 but Hawkins avoided a decider by knocking in an 87 in frame eight.

Mark Williams avoided embarrassment by defeating up-and-coming Chinese teenager Lyu Haotian 5-2. Lyu has already beaten names such as Marco Fu and Dominic Dale but found himself 1-0 down after Williams made a 108 break in the opener. Lyu responded with breaks of 55 and 52 to go 2-1 up although Williams drew level with a 63 break in the fourth. The Welshman then managed to keep a lid on the 15-year-old and won the next three frames with top runs of 60 and 72.

Mark Davis kept his hopes of automatic qualification to the World Championship open with a 5-3 win over Dechawat Poomjaeng. Davis is currently ranked number 16 but with the return of Ronnie O’Sullivan, who is outside that now, the 16^th placed player will have to play one qualifying round match. Poomjaeng however controlled the early stages, knocking in break a break of 68 for the opener but Davis won the next three including runs of 51 and 84. The next two were shared with Poomjaeng closing the gap to 4-3 with a 71 in frame seven but a run of 71 from Davis secured a place in the last 16 against Jack Lisowski.

The other afternoon session match saw Ricky Walden beat Ken Doherty 5-2. The scores were level at the interval but the Chester man dominated after the interval, winning three frames on the bounce.

Mark Selby came within a ball of making a 147 maximum break in his defeat of Mark King in the afternoon session. He was already 2-0 up after making breaks of 111 and 82 and was on 140 when he rattled the final black. He lost out on the £20,000 rolling 147 pot but was still able to smile after the miss. King pulled one back before the interval but Selby eased into a last 16 encounter with Walden with further breaks of 91 and 104.

Stuart Bingham defeated Liang Wenbo 5-3 to progress to the last 16. After a close start to the match, the scores were 2-2 at the interval although breaks of 90 and 79 put Bingham 4-2 up. Wenbo took a close seventh frame but a break of 91 rounded off the win for Bingham.

Mark Allen defeated Scot Anthony McGill, hitting top breaks of 92, 129 and 56. Neil Robertson whitewashed his namesake Jimmy Robertson 5-0 in the other evening session match. The Aussie hit breaks of 72, 58, 70 and 70 on course to victory and will face Allen tomorrow.