Snooker: Favourites on course for second round
Ronnie O’Sullivan and Matthew Stevens, two of the leading contenders for the Embassy World Championship, put themselves on course to reach the second round when the tournament began in Sheffield today.
Title-holder O’Sullivan, aiming to overcome the hoodoo of first-time winners the year after their maiden Crucible victory, took a 6-3 lead over Scotland’s Drew Henry into tonight’s concluding session.
Stevens, runner-up in 2000 and a semi-finalist last year, was even more convincing as he opened up a 7-2 advantage over Redcar’s Mike Dunn.
O’Sullivan, 26, took time to move into overdrive following a sluggish start and will have been pleased with the way he raised his game.
The Rocket was well below his brilliant best before the mid-session interval, allowing Henry to take successive frames for a 2-1 advantage.
But then the champion sprang to life as he made his first attempt at a maximum 147 break, failing with a fine cut on the eighth black when a simple blue would surely have led to a century.
As a sighter, however, it worked wonders, for the world number two looked a different player after the break even though his 33-year-old opponent clung on to level again at 3-3.
O’Sullivan began to get his awesome potting well and truly on song as he rattled in consecutive frame-winning runs of 94 and 91, before extending his margin to three as Henry’s chances of an upset receded markedly.
While the top seed was involved in an early battle for supremacy, Stevens immediately seized command against world number 72 Dunn and a break of 105 the first ton of the event put the Welshman 2-0 ahead.
Dunn, a qualifier who won five matches to secure his Crucible debut, hit back with an 83.
But the sixth seed, who always seems to find his top form for this tournament, stormed clear by winning five consecutive frames.
The highlight was a run of 135 which set the early standard in the quest for the £20,000 highest break prize.
With Stevens 7-1 ahead he looked poised to earn himself an early night when the match concludes tomorrow evening, but Dunn claimed the last frame of the session to leave his 24-year-old rival needing three more to progress.
Graeme Dott, the 14th seed from Glasgow, moved into a 6-3 lead over Robin Hull, the first player from Finland to appear in the final stages of the tournament.
Their match is due to be completed tomorrow morning. Regal Scottish Open runner-up David Gray was level at 3-3 with world number 13 Mark King in a scrappy contest which yielded just one break of more than 50 in the first six frames.
