Ali Carter beats defending champion Ryan Day, Li Hang stuns Barry Hawkins

ByEurosport

Updated 27/07/2018 at 21:50 GMT

Ali Carter won a hard-fought battle 4-3 against defending champion Ryan Day in the first round of the Riga Masters on Friday.

Ali Carter of England in action during his first round match against Shaun Murphy of England on day four of The Dafabet Masters at Alexandra Palace on January 17, 2018 in London, England.

Image credit: Getty Images

The event in Latvia is the first ranking event of the new season, and Carter opened with a break of 75 before Day responded with 88.

In the third frame a long red got Day in but he couldn’t capitalise, scoring just 15 before he allowed Carter back to the table.

Although Carter couldn’t completely clean up he did enough to win the frame and take a 2-1 lead.

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Carter missed a red for frame ball in the fourth thanks to some shenanigans with the spider, and Day took advantage when he came to the table to level up.

A couple of tense snooker battles followed and both players made errors, only for Carter to eventually triumph.

Carter will face Mark Allen in the next round after the Masters champion avoided a shock as he came from 2-0 down to beat Peter Lines 4-3, despite Lines making a break of 133

World champion Mark Williams got off to a brilliant start when he opened up a 3-0 lead over Ben Woollaston.

However Woollaston fought back to 3-2, including a century of 110, but Williams kept his cool to secure a 4-2 win.

Former world champion Neil Robertson lost the opening frame but recovered well to battle past Li Yuan 4-2 in his first round match.

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28-year-old Yuan took the opening frame but Robertson, 36, responded with breaks of 55 and 78 in the second frame to level things up.

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A break of 61 gave him the lead and another of 81 saw him pull back ahead after Yuan had levelled.

Robertson finished the match off with a break of 59 and that sets up a mouth-watering clash with Liang Wenbo in the next round after the 14th seed beat Kurt Maflin 4-2.

There was a shock as Barry Hawkins was knocked out by Li Hang, going down 4-3.

Hang got off to an electric start with breaks of 77 and 80, racing into a 3-0 lead before 'The Hawk' battled back to 3-3.

However he couldn't find the winner as he became the first real upset of the tournament.

And there was a second later on tour newcomer Ashley Carty shocked the experienced Anthony McGill 4-2.

Third seed Shaun Murphy missed out on a possible maximum when he missed a simple yellow on 120 but he still enjoyed a comfortable 4-0 win over David Lilley.

Joe Perry is through, beating Robert Milkins 4-3, as is last year's runner-up Stephen Maguire who beat Gerard Greene 4-1.

Ricky Walden wasted no time in seeing off qualifier Jimmy White, triumphing 4-0.