Snooker: Robertson made an incredible comeback at the Masters.
Despite the fact that the tournament is not ranking, it features the best 16 players in the world (as of early December last year). This means the competition garners significant interest within the snooker community. However, this year, just before the tournament began, an unexpected event occurred. Ronnie O'Sullivan, the reigning champion, withdrew from participation due to medical reasons. This happened just three days before his first scheduled match. Following sports protocol, Ronnie was replaced by the player who was ranked No. 17 at the time the participants' names for the Masters were announced.
How to seize your opportunity? Neil Robertson knows
This participant turned out to be the Australian Neil Robertson. Since the draw had already been made, his opponent was John Higgins, ranked No. 15 (by the way, the Scot set a record by qualifying for the "best of the best" tournament for the 31st consecutive year!). It seemed like the weakest pairing in the round of 16: No. 15 against No. 17. However, what a thriller the participants of this year's Masters first match delivered!
To begin with, Robertson learned about his participation in the Masters only on Friday. Prior to that, he had been playing an "exhibition" match and had less than two days to prepare for the encounter against a challenging opponent. Nevertheless, he started with a tough victory – 59:46 in the first frame. After that, the Scot took charge. John won five frames in a row, making a half-century break in each, while allowing his opponent to score only 16 points! 5:1, and just one small step remained to advance to the next stage. Higgins made half a step in the seventh frame – he was ahead and needed to pot a red ball, just a centimeter from the pocket… He missed.
…The history of the Masters spans over half a century: tournaments under this "banner" have been held since 1975. And only six times in history have comebacks from "1:5" been recorded (it’s worth noting that in all stages matches are played to six winning frames, and only finals are played to ten). Two of those comebacks involved Robertson. In 2020, the Australian was leading against Stephen Maguire but ended up losing. Now he managed to win! He secured two frames, then – in just about 20 minutes – another two. In the deciding frame, the Scot opened the scoring, but Neil got his chance – and he didn’t let it slip: 82:35, and Robertson is through to the quarter-finals!
Other quarter-finalists
Neil's opponent became Sean Murphy, who reached the Masters quarter-finals for the fourteenth time. In the opening match, he defeated Gary Wilson, who was participating in the tournament for only the second time. There were "swings" in this encounter as well. Gary had chances and scored points in the first four frames, but ultimately they went to the break with a score of 4:0 in favor of Murphy. However, the break benefited Wilson: he made a century break, followed by two more half-century breaks, bringing him closer to his opponent: 4:3. Yet, he fell short of more – he made two mistakes that Sean capitalized on. 6:3, and Murphy advances further.
The third pairing in the round of 16 was perhaps the least predictable. Mark Williams won the Masters back in 1998. Meanwhile, Ding Junhui has made 2 maximum breaks out of five recorded at the Masters in the past 50 years! Experience against youth, and all that, ultimately favored youth. 6:5 in favor of the Chinese player, but a break of 136 points at this moment is the best of this year's tournament, achieved by the Welshman in the eighth frame. Additionally, Ding's opponent in the quarter-finals will be the winner of the match between Judd Trump and Barry Hawkins.
Another quarter-finalist is Mark Selby, who is showing excellent form. Last week he won his group in the Champions League, and now he left no chances for Ali Carter. In the first two frames, Carter tried to put up a fight against his renowned opponent but lost them. In the third and fourth frames, he managed to score only one point, while Selby made breaks of 108 and 93 points. So it was 4:0 before the break – the match's outcome was decided. After the break, Ali managed to win one frame, to which Mark responded with another century and a half-century break – 6:1. Now he awaits the winner of the pairing Mark Allen – Si Jiahui.