John Higgins wins a record 4th Welsh Title

John Higgins recorded a 9-3 victory over Ben Woolaston in tonight's final in Cardiff.

The Wizard of Wishaw won his first ranking title since the 2012 Shanghai Masters and his 26th ranking event. Higgins was throughout the stronger player as Ben Woolaston struggled to get anything going in his first full ranking event final. Despite being outplayed in the first session, it was an outrageous fluke for Higgins prevented Woolaston leveling the session at 4-4. Instead Higgins took a crucial 5-3 advantage into the evening session.


In the first frame of the evening session Higgins potted a great long red and made twenty before going in-off while splitting the red. Woolaston was never able to get an easy opportunity though and was snatching at any half chance. John wasn't really missing but was running out of position and there was a real feeling of tension for both players. A similar pattern followed in a very tense 2nd frame which Higgins also won. Once 7-3 infront Higgins relaxed and was able to take the next two frames relatively easily.

Unfortunately it wasn't a great final, John did enough to win comfortably without ever really needing to raise his game, while Ben struggled to settle his nerves. However only a few weeks after losing to an amateur in the China Open qualifying this has proven to be the best week of Ben Woolaston's career and he will hope to build on it for the remaining few weeks of the season. He will rise to a career high ranking of 28 and a similar deep run in a ranking event could see him challenge for the top 16.

For John he has all buy cemented his place in the top 16 for the remainder of the season and will be looking to kick on from this weeks success. I've been saying for a few tournaments I believe I've seen some form in Higgins & that it's been the mental side of the game that's been letting him down. It will be interesting to see if he stops beating himself up over little set backs in matches and return to the granite match player which has led him to Four world titles.

The snooker schedule is packed in the lead up to the World Championships in April. Next up is a few of the smaller events before a ranking event pile up in mid March. The players will be flying to Poland in a week for the Gydnia Open.

Taking Flight in Cardiff

Two days are in the books in the 2015 Welsh Open and 92 players are already on their way home. We're down to the last 32 and it's not been without shocks. Well maybe I should change that to "Shock”, Ding Junhui's and Barry Hawkins defeats wouldn't surprise most people given their form this season. However the Shaun Murphy's defeat to the talented Jamie Jones is more of a shock.

Jones came to the attention of the masses after his great performance at the World Championships a few years ago. Still young and clearly very talented he was tipped to keep rising through the ranks, however he's had a disastrous few years in the qualifiers, going down, rather than up the rankings. Jones will face an all Welsh tie versus Mark Williams next live on Eurosport at 8pm.

The other 13 members of the top 16 are still standing though. Robert Milkins, Xiao Guodong & Mark Davis are all out though in the race for the top 16 for the World Championship. With Mark Williams now overtaking Robert Milkins for the last automatic qualifying spot in the WC.

In the betting I fancy a little £5 bet on Perry, Dott, Walden & Higgins - £20.07

John Higgins has a very good draw, if he can get it together mentally I believe he is cueing well enough to get to the later stages. He will probably have to beat Maguire in the Quarters, a complete bogey player for Higgins in recent years - 2011 PTC event was his last victory - but I think this could be his week to reach a Semi Final.

Graeme Dott is in the race for a top 16 ranking and he will most likely face John Higgins in the last 16 in a crunch match for the last 16. At this point Dott is around £30,000 behind Higgins so will require a few deep tournament runs to catch his fellow Scot. 

Ricky Walden will face Martin Gould in a very tough match to call, hence the good odds but I fancy Ricky to just have enough to go through a close match.

Joe Perry is one of my favourite players to watch, he is very good in every department and fly's under the radar. He is 1/3 today to beat Gary Wilson and I think this is easy money, don't let me down Joe!

The quarter finals are on Friday and I’ve got the following match ups coming up:

Ronnie O'Sullivan v Judd Trump

Mark Allen v Joe Perry

John Higgins v Stephen Maguire

Michael White v Mark Selby

2014 World Championships Preview

The final pieces of the 2014 World Championship draw were completed today at lunchtime.

In short the already very tough bottom half was strengthened even further while the top half is looking more and more predictable.

Robin Hull, the lowest seed to qualify, has the daunting task of facing two time defending champion Ronnie O'Sullivan on Saturday. This
already looks like an impossible task and a potentially kinder opening draw for the Rocket.

I picked out four players I thought were the ones to avoid before the draw: Xiao Guodong, Kyren Wilson, Michael White & Martin Gould. The unfortunate seeds to draw these players are Ali Carter (v Xiao), Ricky Walden (v Wilson), Mark Selby (v White) & Marco Fu (v Gould).

There will be an all Scottish affair after John Higgins was drawn to face his former mentor Alan McManus, good friends off the table this will prove to be a tough but enjoyable match for both players.

Tom Ford v Judd Trump and Ryan Day v Stephen Maguire are both very enticing first round encounters in the already stacked bottom half. I fancy Trump to progress in a tight match. Given Maguire's current form he might be another seed to fall to the three time Crucible quarter finalist Day.

My Predictions in full are

    Ronnie O'Sullivan 10    v     3        Robin Hull          
    Joe Perry       10     v       5    Jamie Burnett          
    Shaun Murphy     10    v     5    Jamie Cope          
    Marco Fu     10    v     6    Martin Gould          
    Barry Hawkins     10    v     4    David Gilbert          
    Ricky Walden     8    v     10    Kyren Wilson          
    Mark Davis     8    v     10    Dominic Dale          
    Ding Junhui     10    v     2    Michael Wasley          
    Mark Selby     10    v     7    Michael White          
    Allister Carter 9    v     10      Xiao Guodong          
    John Higgins     10    v     7    Alan McManus          
    Stuart Bingham     10    v     4    Ken Doherty          
    Judd Trump     10    v     8    Tom Ford          
    Stephen Maguire 6    v     10    Ryan Day          
    Mark Allen     10    v     6    Michael Holt          
    Neil Robertson     10    v     5    Robbie Williams

In recent seasons we've seen a lot of top seeds fall, however this year I've only picked four to fall from 16 matches.

I think the quarter final line up will be

Ronnie O'Sullivan v Shaun Murphy
Hawkins v Ding Junhui
Xiao Guodong v John Higgins
Judd Trump v Neil Robertson

Semi's

Ronnie O'Sullivan v Ding Junhui
John Higgins v Neil Robertson

This is what I think might happen, but it's also a bit of dream semi final line up. The best players of the last 15 years and the new two best players in the world. I would actually pick both the older World Champions in Ronnie O'Sullivan and John Higgins to meet in another World final, one that would surely be a classic, and a 5th World Title for the Wizard of Wishaw.

Champion of Champions Day 1

 The latest high profile event on the snooker tour features 14 champions and the two highest ranked players to have not won an event in the last 12 months.

Opening the show was local boy Mark Selby, only 36 hours after his triumph in Antwerp over Ronnie O'Sullivan, against Shaun Murphy. The match was of high quality and Mark Selby completed a comfortable 4-2 victory. Murphy who has been struggling this season looked improved and considerably leaner. However was unable to mount any serious pressure as Selby's rock solid safety game took the control away from Murphy.

The second match of the afternoon was an all Scottish affair as John Higgins took on Stephen Maguire. This was a superb affair played to a very high standard with Higgins fighting to control a very dangerous looking Maguire. Higgins took a 2-1 lead while Maguire still hadn't missed a pot and the standard continued until the 6th frame when a number of uncharacteristic misses crept into both players games. Higgins missed two or three opportunities to win the match 4-2 and eventually it was Maguire who held his nerve to take it to a decider.

In the decider an unlucky flick off the brown left a shot at a long red for Maguire, the Glasgow based potter took full advantage and knocked in a break that was enough to win the match 4-3.

Selby started as a heavy favourite in the evening to beat Stephen Maguire, mainly I felt due to the advantage of playing first. Selby had had four hours in-between matches while Maguire was left with just over an hour. Selby won four frames in a row from 2-3 to record an excellent win. Maguire was heavily frustrated throughout with Selby’s rock tight safety game and methodical play and lashed out on a few shots. Nothing can be taken away from Selby who looked ominously sharp in the balls.

Selby will have three days off now before returning for Saturday's semi finals. Hopefully the crowds will build as the week goes on & add to what already looks like it could be an excellent event. With a bit of luck ITV can turn down the arena mics so it doesn't sound like an air conditioning unit and not put the adverts on during the match like they did in the Higgins Maguire duel. On a more positive note though, it was a pleasure to listen to Clive Everton commentating again on terrestrial TV.