2015 China Open (Day 6) - Wilson stuns Ding for final place

The semi-finals of the 2015 China Open tournament are over and although many would have thought the final will be disputed between two Top 16 players, they were wrong. Well at least half wrong.

Mark Selby has indeed prevail Kurt Maflin's test and won by a pretty comfortable 6-3 scoreline, but Ding Junhui lost the chance to defend his home-title and was knocked down by an outstanding Gary Wilson, 6-5.

The first one in was the Englishman, a break of 68 opening the scoreline in his favour, to which Ding answered with a myriad of breaks (35, 41, 64, 58 and 38) to fly 3-1 up as the interval was starting. Was this going to be a one-way snooker affair?

The reply came quick, as Wilson returned into the arena more positive and took his chances with … everything.

It was a genuine rain of breaks (50, 33, 60, 68 and 70) that not only helped Gary level up the match, but also took him far, far away, near the border of victory, 5-3.

The snooker fans know that if someone cam pull out of their hat a full comeback, then Ding's the man, so that's exactly what happened; which mind you wasn't an easy thing to accomplish considering that he lost no less than 4 frames in a row.

A top break of 97 proved enough to complete the given task and so the lads ended their cues-battle with a much-awaited decider.

Wilson was the first one to disturb the balls, a brilliant opening red helping him to make a winning 72 break which left Ding in need of 4 snookers!

The crowd cheered for its local hero and so the final battle began. Ding obtained a snooker and a few minutes later a free-ball, but still he needed another snooker to win the dramatic last frame, and the match for that matter.

Despite his effort, which deserves to be praised to be honest, Gary kept his coolness and cleared the table to win his first ever ticket to a ranking final. What a victory for the green-mint-waistcoat-man!

The Mark Selby v. Kurt Maflin clash wasn't as quite as thrilling, but it involved quality snooker and some amazing breaks.

Maflin used a set composed of 64, 74 and 131 breaks, to which his opponent, and still current world champion, responded with 129, 74, 113, 106, 56 and a 7^th frame won on the black for a 6-3 victory.

Drawing the line we have a final ahead of us and it's going to be interesting, to say the least. As usual, the first session will kick off at 7.30 am (UK time) and the match will see its conclusion at 12.30 pm with Brendan Moore - the referee in charge.