UK Championship - Day 8

16:19:00 Ramona Dragomir 0 Comments

Open you eyes wide and also your ears as I am about to tell you who is the second name that reached the 12bet.com UK Championship 2010 big final!!! Nonsense, as most likely many of you already know who won yesterday’s semi-final. :-)))
But anyway, since I like to share things with the whole world, I’m going to tell you that "The Welsh Potting Machine" is back potting those snooker balls and working his way through those crazy long shots....translating.....bip bip bip...still translating....bip bip bip = Mark Williams won the battle against Shaun "The Magician" Murphy in what was, in my humble opinion, the most thrilling match of the tournament!!! I mean it had everything: emotions, drama, laughter, wonderful shots, horrible misses, tension, wonder, hope, disappointment....all the feelings in the world were brutally mixed up together to make this semi-final a very entertaining one! :-P




It all started with Ken Doherty and Willie Thorne in the commentary box, trying and succeeding, to keep us inform in what was going on in the arena with the two players. The cameras were ready, Rob Walker was also ready to give his usual and special welcome "Let’s get the boys on the baize" note, the players were very anxious to get the battle started and at home we, the fans were so damn curious to see how this match will end.

Mark Williams potting his way through the final
Williams was the one who broke the ice as he rushed in to take over the first two frames by hitting in breaks of 46, 38 and 54, only to see Murphy take his first step with a 91 one. But the Welshman continued in potting those balls, proving that since his first match things are a bit better and he means serious business; so he hit a wonderful 73 to make it 3-1, break that received a 33 clearance in the next frame and a 45 break in the following one, all Shaun’s style. The score was now 3-3 and we all had expectations that this first session will end up in a draw, but....what do you know?! It didn’t! Mainly, because Mark took over the last two frames with runs of 30 and 34. This was getting interesting! :-)


The second session had John Virgo and Dennis Taylor in charge of commentating it and it was by far one of the craziest sessions that I’ve ever seen! Such a blast!
Things started with Mark trying to build a nice and steady break, that was brutally interrupted at 43, then Shaun came and missed in potting a red into the left superior pocket, Mark came back to try his luck with that same ball but he didn’t succeed in potting it, then a safety shots battle followed and Shaun conceded the frame to make the score 6-3!


What happened next was the apogee of the match, as Williams started in losing his way through the balls, committed some really bad mistakes, while Shaun was winning "effortlessly" one frame at a time. How many, do you ask? Well, I don’t know....hm...Let’s see, let me count...4! Yep, four frames to level things up and two more to bring the match one step closer to his victory at 8-6. Now, don’t get me wrong the guy worked damn hard for those frames, as Shaun cueing was foulness and he hit some marvelous breaks of 129, 107 and 73!
"The Magician" was back, baby! He was rocking around that snooker table and kept Mark in his chair for 74 minutes! It was pure madness! He made a spectacular comeback and he was playing so good that I had no doubt he will win this match and secure himself a place in the final, by doing so.


Oh, Lordy....I lost! :-(
But in the 15th frame, Mark started to give clear signs of recovering from those horrible minutes of silence as he won all the remaining frames with breaks of 55 and 34! Shaun was absolutely hypnotized by how well Mark was potting those balls and at the end of the match he congratulated him in all honesty, as he shook his hand and said plenty of times "Well played!"
Back in the BBC 2 improvised studious, Hazel Irvine along with John Parrot and Steve Davis were expecting Mark Williams to give them his first impressions of the match. It was the most hilarious interview ever, as Mark was practically under the "spell of wining”, he seemed not to believe it himself and when he was asked how in the world he could make that wonderful comeback and pot those hard balls, he replayed that he honestly doesn’t know, but it was probably out of despair! :-)))


To be honest I’m really sorry for Shaun as he played brilliantly well this tournament and he stood up to some pretty heavy names like Neil Robertson. He had an amazing run and for that he has my sincere admiration and my honest congratulations. He played like a true professional!
On the other hand, Mark had a horrible start...just horrible! If you remember the match with Hendry then you know what I’m talking about! However from that match on his cueing has improved and has being improving big time, as he won that great match against Mark Joyce 9-7 and I think that victory has given him his confidence back, as last night he was on fire. He started pretty good in the first session, continued not very brilliant in the second one but closed with a wonderful performance. A performance that Murphy didn’t know how to step up to...it was that good! And if he keeps up his good form and adds some more to it, he was a pretty good chance to win today’s final.


So my dears please clear your schedule and be sure to follow the final battle for this year’s UK Championship, for it’s going to be such a tremendous show of snooker!


From 2:00 pm and from 8:00 pm (UK time)
John Higgins v. Mark Williams (TV)


TV coverage
14:00 – 17:20 (BBC 2)
14:00 - 17:00 (British Eurosport 2)
19:30 - 22:30 (British Eurosport)
20:00 – 00:00 (BBC 2)

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