It's time for the second biggest tournament of the year.
Here's the draw:
http://ift.tt/2gd8Jgz
All the big names are on the start again this week. So the favorites should probably be Mark Selby, John Higgins, Judd Trump, Ding Junhui and Ronnie O'Sullivan. But the first four rounds are all "just" Best-of-11, so there is plenty of room for upsets.
In the first section defending champion Neil Robertson should be the favorite, but his recent level of play is pretty inconsistent. But the same is true for the two other most prominent names here with Mark Williams and Ricky Walden. But maybe Thepchaiya Un-Nooh can use this advantage and get into the quarterfinals?
In the second section Ronnie, who once again - also when you take section 1 into account - has one of the easier draws, is the clear favorite. Joe Perry is also here as is the ever inconsistent Michael White.
In section three Ding Junhui should overcome his two first matches (against Igor Figueiredo and the winner of Joe Swail/Ross Muir) before he could have a rematch of this years World Championship semifinal against Alan McManus. If the Scotsman makes it that far, which is quite uncertain this year. A big threat for Ding could be Ali Carter. Also David Gilbert is in this section.
Section four belongs to Judd Trump. The next highest seeds here are Marco Fu and Martin Gould, both which are playing a quite poorly season so far.
The bottom half seems to be a little more interesting, though again thanks to a draw of 128 names we shouldn't expect many great match-ups in the earlier rounds.
Section 5 could bring us a 3rd-round-match between World Number 2 Stuart Bingham and freshly World Ranking Event Winner Mark King though. King would have to beat probably Luca Brecel in round two before though. And in the other half of this section are Barry Hawkins and Stephen Maguire. Or maybe the supertalented Zhao Xintong maybe gets his first breakthrough?
Also section 6 has some kind of interest for me. We could have 2nd round matches between Liang Wenbo and 16-year old Yan Bingtao as well as Zhou Yuelong against Michael Holt. And the winner of these matches play each other. In the second half of this draw is Shaun Murphy with probably Dominic Dale as the biggest hindrance to reach round four.
In section 7 John Higgins is the big favorite. Biggest threat here is Mark Allen, who could ahve to beat Anthony Hamilton and Ryan Day before.
Finally we have the world champion in the last part of the draw. Mark Selby could meet Tom Ford or Robert Milkins in round three and probably one of the youngsters Kyren Wilson or Anthony McGill in the fourth round.
My guess at the quarter-finals:
Tchepchaiya Un-Nooh - Ronnie O'Sullivan
Ali Carter - Judd Trump
Stuart Bingham - Dominic Dale
John Higgins - Mark Selby
I tried to call a few surprises, but as always with this, as the definition of the word already implicates I'm pretty sure there will some, but probably none of these I called.
2016 UK Championship
Here's the draw:
http://ift.tt/2gd8Jgz
All the big names are on the start again this week. So the favorites should probably be Mark Selby, John Higgins, Judd Trump, Ding Junhui and Ronnie O'Sullivan. But the first four rounds are all "just" Best-of-11, so there is plenty of room for upsets.
In the first section defending champion Neil Robertson should be the favorite, but his recent level of play is pretty inconsistent. But the same is true for the two other most prominent names here with Mark Williams and Ricky Walden. But maybe Thepchaiya Un-Nooh can use this advantage and get into the quarterfinals?
In the second section Ronnie, who once again - also when you take section 1 into account - has one of the easier draws, is the clear favorite. Joe Perry is also here as is the ever inconsistent Michael White.
In section three Ding Junhui should overcome his two first matches (against Igor Figueiredo and the winner of Joe Swail/Ross Muir) before he could have a rematch of this years World Championship semifinal against Alan McManus. If the Scotsman makes it that far, which is quite uncertain this year. A big threat for Ding could be Ali Carter. Also David Gilbert is in this section.
Section four belongs to Judd Trump. The next highest seeds here are Marco Fu and Martin Gould, both which are playing a quite poorly season so far.
The bottom half seems to be a little more interesting, though again thanks to a draw of 128 names we shouldn't expect many great match-ups in the earlier rounds.
Section 5 could bring us a 3rd-round-match between World Number 2 Stuart Bingham and freshly World Ranking Event Winner Mark King though. King would have to beat probably Luca Brecel in round two before though. And in the other half of this section are Barry Hawkins and Stephen Maguire. Or maybe the supertalented Zhao Xintong maybe gets his first breakthrough?
Also section 6 has some kind of interest for me. We could have 2nd round matches between Liang Wenbo and 16-year old Yan Bingtao as well as Zhou Yuelong against Michael Holt. And the winner of these matches play each other. In the second half of this draw is Shaun Murphy with probably Dominic Dale as the biggest hindrance to reach round four.
In section 7 John Higgins is the big favorite. Biggest threat here is Mark Allen, who could ahve to beat Anthony Hamilton and Ryan Day before.
Finally we have the world champion in the last part of the draw. Mark Selby could meet Tom Ford or Robert Milkins in round three and probably one of the youngsters Kyren Wilson or Anthony McGill in the fourth round.
My guess at the quarter-finals:
Tchepchaiya Un-Nooh - Ronnie O'Sullivan
Ali Carter - Judd Trump
Stuart Bingham - Dominic Dale
John Higgins - Mark Selby
I tried to call a few surprises, but as always with this, as the definition of the word already implicates I'm pretty sure there will some, but probably none of these I called.
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