Selby wins his 11th title in China

Mark Selby won 10-8 over Mark Williams in the China Open grand final, this counting as his forth ranking title this season and the 11th of his career.

Selby's tremendous reign started by winning the Paul Hunter Classic in August 2016, continued with the International Championship where he defeated Ding Junhui by an outstanding 10-1 scoreline, followed by taking the UK Championship crown back in December by beating Ronnie O'Sullivan 10-7.

The 2017 China Open final was not an easy task for "The Jester from Leicester" as Mark Williams proved to be in quite a form and kept us on our tenterhooks.

The world number one started as the favourite, using runs of 54, 100 and 109 to take a 3-1 lead, but Williams found enough motivation to crawl back into the match just in time, ending the first session at 5-4 down thanks to top breaks of 82 and 106.

The last part of these two green baize gladiators meeting was a genuine thriller, as they went on hand in hand, sharing frames with the only difference that this time, Williams was the one putting his nose in front.


Frame number 15 was a very tense one but it was finally won on the pink by the Welshman, Selby responding with breaks of 70 and 124 to draw level and move one away from victory; victory that he recorded a few minutes later after a half-century break.

Thrilled to bits for his victory (and £85,000 richer), Selby openly admitted that he was part of a "fantastic match" and that he really looks forward to Sheffield to defend his title.

On the opposite corner though, Mark Williams defeat also means he will have to qualify for Sheffield this year as he drops out of the TOP 16 and needs to win three matches for a walk in the Crucible arena.

This Wednesday the qualifiers for the World Championship will kick off, this meaning that we will see some pretty tense and exciting matches taking place at the Ponds Forge Int Sports Centre, where only 16 lucky players will prevail in the end.

Photo credit: World Snooker