Teen star beats Higgins

Kacper Filipiak, the current European U21 champion, defeated Higgins and world number eight Stephen Maguire but his Poland side lost the match against Scotland 3-2 having suffered losses in the other two singles frames and the doubles frame.

Nonetheless, Filipiak impressed all that were watching, not least three-times world snooker champion Ronnie O'Sullivan who has been following the event from his home in England on Eurosport.

"Tip for you all, just seen this 15-year-old from Poland. He will be World Champion. Nice player," tweeted O'Sullivan.

Filipiak, who also beat former Grand Prix winner Marco Fu, played down the significance of his victory over Higgins.

"Against John there was no pressure on me. If I had lost nothing would've happened as I was expected to lose so I was really relaxed," he said.

"I was a bit lucky as I've never seen John make three big mistakes after the break. I have now won three singles matches, against Stephen Maguire, John Higgins and Marco Fu, but this is only my second big tournament."

After the defeat Higgins said that Filipiak reminded him of a young Stephen Hendry.

"He looks very serious and probably reminds you of a young Stephen Hendry. We were speaking about it and heard he only made a break of 50 or 60 to win the junior (European Under 21s) event, but in his first four frames here he's made bigger breaks.

"He's improving and doing so very quickly - he's probably the best player of the tournament so far. He didn't look like missing."

Filipiak will be allowed to compete on the professional tour this season due to his victory at the Euro U21 Championship.

Previously you had to be at least 16 to play on the pro tour, but those rules have recently been relaxed.

The group stages for the snooker World Cup are ongoing but Poland have a good chance of reaching the quarter-finals which take place on Saturday.