2015 World Championship ( Day 6) - Trump and Murphy get Last 16 spot

Ahoy, me hearties and welcome to another episode of "The Crucible dream". Today the stars in action are Judd Trump and Shaun Murphy, both of them booking their place into the much-beloved and much-more-close-to-finish-line Last 16 round.

The player who landed in the grand final of the 2011 World Championship and left it as a runner-up (aka. Judd Trump in case you were wondering) had a pretty comfortable lead of 7-2 over Crucible-debutant Stuart Carrington.

However, things didn't go as smoothly as one might expect once the second session started. And by that I mean that Stuart got out his guns and started shooting.

A break of 97 was the first bullet to come out of Stuart's cue, to which his much-experienced opponent answered with a 74.

Still, Carrington didn't give in and with breaks of 74 and 70 was winning himself two consecutive frames to trail 8-5 at the interval.

After the mini-break Trump moved one away from victory thanks to a 76 break, but Stu kept the match alive with a 99 (if he hadn't missed the black he would have recorded his first Crucible century break).

Minutes later though, Judd fired a traditional 109 to go 10-6 and book his place into the Last 16 where he's meeting Hong Kong's Marco Fu.

Shaun Murphy also got a spot next to the snooker stars of the Last 16 after beating Finland’s Robin Hull by 10-3.
 
The lads had a pretty one-sided first session a day before, but it's fair to say Robin had his chances and missed crucial opportunities to capitalise when he was amongst the balls. Thus the session ended 7-2 in favour of the Smurf.

The match saw it conclusion with frame 10 clinched on the black and the following one won with a top break of 43, both of them entering Murphy’s bag, to which his opponent reply with a dramatic 33 clearance on the black to overcome Shaun's previous 64 break. It was 9-3.

This was Hull's last major contribution to the match, for Murphy finished the Finish player with a 111 break to set a snooker clash with Joe Perry.

Defending champion Mark Selby and the new Nugget, Anthony McGill were the first to open the Last 16 round of matches, after their first session the scoreline going as tight as it can go: 4-4.

McGill took the first to frames of the match with a top break of 63, but Selby went on and captured the next three with breaks of 51, 46, 65 and 87 to go 3-2 up.

Scotland's Highlander fired two amazing breaks of 74 and 73 to put his nose back in front at 4-3, but the eight frame was won dramatically on the last black (Ants missed it after potting an out-of-this-world pink) by Selby.

Ding Junhui and John Higgins also started their quest for a place in the quarter-finals, their first encounter resulting into a 5-3 lead for the Scotsman.

Higgins was sure to take the first two frames of the evening, his opponent having to pull out a real piece of entertainment under the form of a break of 135 to break the ice and get some points on the scoreboard.

A top break of 73 was helping Higgins advance even further at 5-1 up, before Ding could feel threatened enough and perform one of those special breaks-of-comeback that he likes to hit. 

So with a set composed of a 67 and a 94, China's hero enters into the second session with a two-frame deficit.

The cue-battles continue tomorrow, as it follows:

10am
Mark Selby v. Anthony McGill (4-4)
Graeme Dott v. Stuart Bingham

2.30pm
Barry Hawkins v. Mark Allen
Ding Junhui v. John Higgins (3-5)

7pm
Mark Selby v. Anthony McGill (last session)
Graeme Dott v. Stuart Bingham

*all hours are UK time