Players Tour Championship Event 5 (2011) - Day 4

It was a loong, looong day (and night) in Sheffield for our beloved cueists as the last match finished somewhere around 1.30am (UK time). But regardless of this little, tiny aspect, it was a glorious day filled with high standard snooker and a lot of close results. A place in the Last 16 seems to be very desirable these days :-)

Two world-champions have signed their names on the Last 16 round list: Neil Robertson and John Higgins. Higgins seemed to have regained some strength after losing 3-0 to Robertson during this week's Premier League, as he started his journey with a perfect 4-0 over David Grace, continued with a 4-2 over Michael Wasley and finished by taking on his fellow-country, Alan McManus whom he beat 4-1.

Another PTC event,another Last 16 place for Yan

For Robertson things couldn't be any easier: the Australian crashed the youngster Eden Sharav 4-0, ended on a very tight 4-3 with India's great star Aditya Mehta, only to end his day by defeating another Scotsman, Scott Mackenzie 4-2. It’s true that Scott fought like a lion and managed to pull back two consecutive frames after being lead 3-0, but the 2010 world-champion was stronger and did his job in winning every match he could.

During PTC 4 event, Li Yan was practically on fire. He successfully defeated Michael Holt, Xiao Guodong and John Higgins to reach the Last 16 and it seems he enjoyed it so much that he decided to do it all over again. So with a 4-0 over the Polish player Kacper Filipiac, a 4-3 over Liu Chuang and a glorious 4-1 over Judd Trump, Li booked a place in the next round.

A good day for Day

It was a very prolific day for Ryan Day, the Welshman cashing victories over Kurt Maflin (4-0), Kyren Wilson (4-1) and Rod Lawler (4-0), but also for Martin Gould whose scorelines of 4-2 against Ashley Wright, 4-1 over Luca Brecel and 4-0 in front of the legendary Jimmy White, have guaranteed him to go further in the competition.

And since I mentioned the legend Jimmy White, I must also mention another one, "The Nugget" Steve Davis. Although Steve managed to win his first two matches (against Sean O'Sullivan and Adam Duffy), he was kneeled down by Michael Holt with a 4-1 scoreline. Actually this was Holt's last match of the day and this result along with the 4-1 he obtained in front of Chris Keogan and the 4-2 he performed on Robert Milkins secured him a place to meet Martin Gould in today's Last 16 round.

Hawkins - back in business

I was telling you at the beginning of this article that it was a long, long day and night in Sheffield and these following two players are to be blamed for that. Noooo, just kidding, the lads did their best in order to earn the last of the remaining two spots in the competition.

And so, Michael White's 4-3 against John Sutton, 4-2 over the Scot Ants McGill and a 4-1 in front on Dechawat Poomjaeng were enough to end the day as a victorious player, while for Barry Hawkins hammering Douglas Hogan 4-1, defeating Liang Wenbo 4-2 and ending on a very, very tight 4-3 with Stuart Bingham, surely did the trick.

Below you can check Day 4 list of results: