Welcome to the penultimate ranking tournament in the lovely land that is Beijing! This is the last chance to automatically qualify for the Crucible; the last chance to achieve a ranking to play against lower-ranked players in the qualifiers; and the last chance to get a ranking title under their belts! We had many interesting scraps in this event before because of the intensity of qualifying for the best and biggest tournament in the world (no, I’m not talking about the Championship League!)
In 2015, Stephen Maguire pipped Ding Junhui and Liang Wenbo to the post by reaching the semi-finals to steal the No. 16 place from under their noses, forcing the Chinese pair to the qualifiers. Even Maguire said after winning his quarter-final to do so, he hadn’t felt pressure like it. Last year, Ryan Day was sweating when Mark Williams reached the 2017 final, with winning the title meaning overtaking Day to automatically qualify for the Crucible. Thankfully for Dynamite, Williams lost the final to Mark Selby 10-8, meaning Day’s No.16 position was intact.
Day finds himself at No. 16 again, but it does look like he needs more than a miracle to qualify. Despite winning two ranking events, he failed to qualify for the China Open this year by losing 6-3 to Lyu Haotian, meaning his fate is completely out of his hands. With No.17 Mark Allen only a few hundred quid behind him and a new prize fund of £1,000,000 in the event (with £225,000 going to the winner), the race is wide open to such an extent that Andrew Higginson can mathematically overtake Day by winning the title (assuming those in the race lose early so very unlikely, but we’ve seen weirder things!)
It’s still amazing when back in 2005, the prize fund was only (as I say only) £200,000. Anyways, back to the draw and all eyes will be on Mark Allen here. Mark faces a number of tricky players, with Welsh Open semi-finalist Noppon Saengkham being his opponent, followed by potentially his hardest route of Yan Bingtao, two-time ranking champion this season Mark Williams and World Champion Mark Selby. Maguire is also in the same quarter, so this is the one to watch out for while confusing and maddening oneself with every permutation of who and how one can qualify that could even be possible!
This also gives a great insight to which players finish on the best form to be ready for the World Championship. Ding, Selby and Neil Robertson have very out-of-sorts seasons, though all three of these talented players have won the China Open before, with Selby being the current champion, having won three titles in Beijing in the last four seasons. Neil has only reached the quarter-finals once since his Scottish Open win and he will be against Robbie Williams who beat him in the 2017 International Championship.
Looking at the other side of the field there are people hoping to get into the Top 80. The reason being is because those between No.17 – No.80 will play No.81 and below, giving those players a huge advantage when picking up valuable points to nail their first rookie year or to stay on tour. Jak Jones, Martin O’Donnell and Craig Steadman are the only ones who can knock No. 80 Mitchell Mann off his perch, but they would need two more wins to do so. Jones, Steadman and Sam Baird are far behind on the one-year ranking list to qualify for two more seasons, so will need crucial ranking points. For more information, here is the link: http://www.snooker.org/res/index.asp?template=34
Last but not least, we will see the World Under-21 champion Fan Zhengyi and World Under-21 runner-up and WSF Championship winner Luo Honghao in the tournament. Both teenagers will start their first years as professionals next season and have shown plenty of promise by defeating some of the best amateurs in the world. The Chinese conveyor belt of snooker players seems to be well oiled after seeing Zhou, Yan and Cao blossom, so they have a lot to prove! They play in the preliminary round, with Fan and Luo could potentially play Andrew Higginson and Stuart Carrington respectively.
Mark Selby / Wang Yuchen vs. Scott Donaldson
Ben Woollaston vs. Lee Walker
Lyu Haotian vs. Liam Highfield
Stephen Maguire vs. Fergal O’Brien
Mark Davis vs. Michael Holt
Thepchaiya Un-Nooh vs. Mark Williams
Kurt Maflin vs. Yan Bingtao
Noppon Saengkham vs. Mark Allen
Quarter-Final Winner: Mark Selby vs. Mark Allen
John Higgins vs. Martin O’Donnell
Anthony Hamilton vs. Jack Lisowski
Ali Carter vs. Gary Wilson
Joe Perry vs. Chris Totten
Peter Ebdon / Zhang Yong // Chang Bingyu vs. Mark King
Andrew Higginson / Chen Feilong // Fan Zhengyi vs. Kyren Wilson
Jimmy Robertson vs. Xiao Goudong
Craig Steadman vs. Ding Junhui / Michael Georgiou
Quarter-Final Winner: John Higgins vs. Kyren Wilson
Jak Jones vs. Nigel Bond
Zhou Yuelong vs. Chen Zhe
Neil Robertson vs. Robbie Williams
Martin Gould vs. Sam Craigie
Hamza Akbar vs . Ricky Walden
Matthew Stevens vs. Stuart Bingham
Mark Joyce vs. Graeme Dott
Chris Wakelin vs. Shaun Murphy
Quarter-Final Winner: Neil Robertson vs. Stuart Bingham
Barry Hawkins vs. Sam Baird
Michael White vs. Paul Davison
Luca Brecel vs. Cao Yupeng
David Gilbert vs. Mike Dunn
Duane Jones vs. Liang Wenbo / Rhys Clark
Stuart Carrington / Basem Eltahhan // Luo Honghao vs. Anthony McGill
Tom Ford vs. Yuan Sijun
Elliot Slessor vs. Ronnie O’Sullivan / Ross Muir
Quarter-Final Winner: David Gilbert vs. Ronnie O’Sullivan
Tournament Winner: Mark Selby vs. Neil Robertson
The 2018 China Open will take place between 2nd – 8th April 2018.
