2017 Masters (Day 4) - Selby prevails Williams' test

We are half way there with this year's edition of the Masters and yesterday we witnessed the fourth consecutive decider, Mark Selby prevailing Mark Williams' test and winning 6-5 after quite a battle of nerves.

On a totally different note though, Barry Hawkins recorded an outstanding victory of 6-1 over the 2015 Masters champion, Shaun Murphy.

Mark Williams started the match with a strategic 65 clearance that awarded him the opener, but by the time the mid-session interval kicked off, Selby was 3-1 up thanks to breaks of 139, 62 and 109.


But after not potting a single ball during the last three frames (in compassion with Selby's 327 carefully collected points), Williams won two scrappers to draw level at 3-3.

The reigning world champion managed to regain his leading position by winning frame 7, but Williams caught up with him after hitting a half-century break, the pattern repeating itself when Selby took frame 9 and the Welshman used runs of 53 and 58 to force the decider.

Unfortunately for Williams, a tremendous kick proved to be quite costly, his opponent using a solid 89 to close the match and get his quarter-finals place.


The Alexandra Palace's atmosphere is clearly magical, but when the evening came it seemed that there was no magic left for Shaun Murphy, "The Magician" being defeated 6-1 by Barry Hawkins.

Hawkins used breaks of 79, 89 and 85 to fly at 5-0 up before Murphy could win his first (and last) frame of the match and added a 50 to close the deal and set a quarters meeting with Mark Selby.

And since we are talking about the quarter-finals, it's time to see the first ones:

1pm
Ronnie O'Sullivan v Neil Robertson

7pm
Marco Fu v Mark Allen

*all hours are UK time

Photos 2&3 credit: World Snooker