Haikou World Open 2012 (Day 2) - Jin longs and obtains victory over Ding

Jin Long makes another victim

The second day of this year's edition of World Open tournament saw the actual battles of cues starting. 

No more wildcards, just good old fashioned professional snooker. Still, that didn't stop amateur Jin Long from hammering the winner of the recently ended Welsh Open tournament, Ding Junhui by 5-1.

Judd Trump, Michael Holt and Stephen Lee ended their first day of cue action with a perfect 5-0 scoreline, Graeme Dott showed himself to be merciless in front of Barry Hawkins who suffered a 5-2 defeat, while John Higgins and Shaun Murphy ended their opponents' run, Marco Fu and Ricky Walden respectively with a 5-3 scoreline.

Do you remember the game "Chinese Checkers"? Is a board game that's played ironically, also with balls, but with smaller ones than the snooker balls, the objective being to get from one side of the board to the opposite one, before your rival gets to your "home" (the place you started from) first.

A very defeated, Dign Junhui

The entire game is based on how well a player can place the little round pieces on the table, hopping with one ball at the time over the other ones. Anyway, if you have played the game you know what I'm talking about, and if not, then get one, because it's very fun.

The thing here is that's exactly what happened with Jin Long and Ding Junhui. While Jin found no difficulty whatsoever to get around the table and direct the balls into one of the six available pockets, Ding was stuck. Literally, he was stuck.

With far less time table than his opponent, Ding only managed to win a frame as the interval was kicking off, while Jin already had three in his bag, obtained with breaks of 66, 63 and 39.

After the mid-session interval, the wildcard player that send home Sam Baird the other day, cleared the table with a great 76 break to get closer to the finish line, while runs of 46 and 34 were sealing a 5-1 victory.
Almost stuffed in his seat, Ding seemed to have given up on the fight a couple of frames before the inevitable happened and he lost.

Trump takes a great start

Three matches ended on a 5-0 scoreline, Judd Trump being the one who "started the new trend" after he crashed poor Andrew Higginson. Although for many, Trump's victory is not a shock, if you are to think about the fact that the match as a whole was not a fluent one and it only contained a 111 break, then you start getting the facts.

The player from Bristol broke the ice by taking a pretty scrappy opener, but Higginson seemed to level after a 74 break. Trump was in need of two snookers, but the UK Champion got them both, plus a free ball and cleared for a final 75-74 scoreline. That was the moment that would change the entire match. 

It was impossible not to see Higginson huge disappointment, while Trump found the strength to build himself breaks after breaks and get the next three frames on broad for a place in the Last 16.

Higgins wins his first match

A few minutes later Michael Holt was heading towards the same direction as Trump after he crashed Stuart Bingham 5-0 using breaks of 58, 54, 45, 33 and 61, closely followed by Big Bear Stephen Lee who saw off Dominic Dale after hitting in runs of 54, 38, 47, 32 and 49.

Though far from his best, the current world champion, John Higgins prevailed the battle against Marco Fu by 5-3, after he initially lead the Hong-Kong-born-player 3-0. 
Fu fought back right before the interval started with a top break of 49 to pull back a frame, but Higgins retuned after the 15-minute break a bit revived and used a 71 to remake the three-frames gap at 4-1, this time.

Murphy know when to play the winner card

A series of 28, 40 and a clearance of 63 points were putting a bit of a pressure over Higgins, as his opponent was now just one point behind him at 3-4, but the Scotsman ended the deal the very next frame with a 77.

A very determined Graeme Dott kneeled down Barry Hawkins 5-2, although the match didn't produce fireworks, while Shaun Murphy and Ricky Walden engaged in what seemed to be a pretty tense battle of cues.

Walden, forced to go home.

The lads were separated only by a frame, Walden being the one who would always put his nose in front. That until the scoreline became 3-3. From that point on, Murphy broke the pattern with a bit of help from runs of 17, 13 and 20 and continued to impose his dominance with a great 115 clearance that was giving him a free ticket to the Last 16 round.


Below you can check Day 2 list of results:

9 John Higgins 5-3 Marco Fu
21 Shaun Murphy 5-3 Ricky Walden
13 Graeme Dott 5-2 Barry Hawkins

Tomorrow the action restarts with:

6.30am
24 Mark Selby v. Lu Ning
17 Mark Williams v. Mark King
19 Mark Allen v. Jimmy Robertson
22 Matthew Stevens v. Joe Perry

11.30am
12 Stephen Maguire v. Robert Milkins
16 Neil Robertson v. Stephen Hendry
10 Martin Gould v. Jamie Cope
*all hours are UK time

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