John Higgins beats Lyu Haotian to reach quarter-finals, Dominic Dale battles past Jimmy White at Scottish Open
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Updated 15/12/2023 at 07:21 GMT
Jimmy White started brightly in the second round of the Scottish Open against another veteran of the sport, Dominic Dale. White hinted at an upset when he took the first frame, but Dale battled through the match to claim a 4-1 victory after the two veterans struggled to find any rhythm between them. Elsewhere, Kyren Wilson's run was ended by Chris Wakelin and John Higgins also advanced.
Wilson fights back with fifth century at Scottish Open - 'This isn't done yet'
John Higgins defeated Lyu Haotian to reach the Scottish Open quarter-finals, while Dominic Dale beat Jimmy White 4-1 in the second round and Chris Wakelin ended Kyren Wilson's run.
A break of 89 from Lyu Haotian helped him to the first frame in his match against former world No. 1 John Higgins.
Lyu looked to cut a red into the bottom right but forced the shot as he looked for position, and Higgins came back to the table 47-24 up, and was able to sink a relatively straightforward red before working his way through.
In the third frame, a 68 from Higgins helped put the pressure on his opponent, and a mistake from the Chinese player at 72-0 led him to concede the frame as the home favourite took the lead for the first time in the match.
An early slip of concentration from Lyu in the following frame allowed Higgins in and he seized his chance, getting out of a tough spot when he glanced a pink to the middle pocket early on, positioning the white for the next red. However he then attempted to improve his position as he put a lot of work into the pink again - placed on the black spot - and he missed to end his break at 18.
Lyu then cleared the remaining balls with a break of 91 as he demonstrated his talent once more, taking him to a 100-18 win in the fourth frame.
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Wilson fights back with fifth century at Scottish Open - 'This isn't done yet'
However, trailing 15-8 and looking to develop the pack of reds, Lyu again missed to the bottom right - the third time at that point in what was becoming a recurrent weakness - and Higgins then missed his own chance when three sets of spectators were called upon to sit down promptly, with the veteran looking frustrated when he got back to his seat.
Higgins was able to get back to the table when Lyu failed to nail a double, and while he fluked a red, he expertly sunk a green with the cue ball stuck in the top-right jaws, before clearing the rest for a 62-54 victory to retake the lead.
Higgins’ break came to an end at 51 and another poor shot with a red missed to the middle pocket, allowed Lyu back in.
Lyu then came to the table with the reds well spread out but again fell short as he looked to build a comeback, with Higgins able to return and force his rival to concede the frame, and the match.
Sanderson Lam reached the quarter-finals as he beat another Scottish entrant, Anthony McGill, 4-1, and Tom Ford defeated Martin O'Donnell 4-2.
Noppon Saengkham beat Matthew Selt 4-3, and Stuart Bingham enjoyed a whitewash 4-0 win over Zhang Anda.
In the earlier set of matches, Dale was 61-0 up before White was able to get some points on the board, but after adding 12 he returned to the table once more and potted a wonderful red to the top-right pocket to start a new break, only for things to break down once more after a poor positional shot from potting the yellow, leaving a narrow angle on two reds by the pink spot.
However White, who defeated Jimmy Robertson in the first round, was able to leave Dale in an awkward spot of his own and the veteran was soon back at the table to squeeze through with a 64-61 win in the first frame.
At the start of the second frame, White conceded a couple of fouls with Dale happy to let his opponent look for a way out, trapped behind the lower-scoring colours with no clear path to the reds.
Dale made hay when he was finally ready to take to the table and went 41 clear before White had a chance making a break of 16 before he rattled the pocket in the bottom left with a red.
The Spaceman had enjoyed a streak of good form at the Shoot Out, where he finished as a quarter-finalist, and he made a swift break of 35 to claim the frame to level.
In the early exchanges of the third frame, Dale was put back in at 8-1 ahead, but the colours had all skewed to the left-hand side of the table, with the majority of the reds pooled in the bottom left, leaving a challenge to build.
At 18-1, with the pair exchanging attempted snookers behind the yellow, Dale accidentally rolled the white into the blue, lurking over the pocket. The next bout of stalemate was broken, finally, when Dale was able to glide a red into the middle pocket, and some adept play thereafter took the third frame 70-23.
White moved 56-24 clear with a break falling just short of a half century as the scrappy play continued, ending with an attempted pot on the red with a rest into the bottom right, and a fluid 45 from Dale edged him back in front to take him just one frame from victory.
In the final frame, White sunk the white as he potted the black with a powerful effort, putting Dale back in with a 55-29 lead, but was quickly back in to add six before getting stuck on three reds clustered against the cushion.
At 70-43 White still had a slim chance of battling back to stay in the game but when he potted the white again, the error-strewn match came to a close, and Dale progressed.
Meanwhile, Wakelin advanced a 4-2 winner over Kyren Wilson.
In the first frame, Wilson and Wakelin were set at 25-28 in Wakelin’s favour; they exchanged some safety play near the top of the table, but a double - either outstanding or a fluke - at long range set Wilson up for a potential clearance.
Wilson scored heavily enough for Wakelin to need three snookers with all the colours remaining, but once he had sunk the yellow, there was no way back and he conceded the frame.
WIlson was on top in the second frame, winning it 75-38, and at 52-4 up in the third frame he started to lose control of the cue ball, and gave himself a tough red to the middle pocket, which he duly missed.
However Wakelin, whose pot success at the time stood at just 69%, promptly missed only to be given another bite by Wilson, who was also struggling with his own at 86%.
A good shot with the rest allowed him the chance to bring the remaining two reds into play off the side cushion, and his break of 64 allowed him to halve the deficit.
An outstanding long pot from Wilson, his third success from seven attempts at that point in the match, risked letting his opponent in but instead allowed him to build a break of 25 before a poor positional shot as he potted a pink left him to miss a red to the bottom left.
Wakelin then made a break of 79 that was stopped by a kiss on the brown that blocked his chance of potting the yellow, but Wilson was ready to concede to leave the scores level.
The early moments of the next frame led to speculation that there might be a re-rack but Wilson broke the deadlock before Wakelin came in at 16-0 with midnight looming, and some careless safety from Wilson.
It was well past midnight when the scores were finally settled as Wakelin marched on in the tournament.
In one of the other afternoon matches, Zhou Yuelong defeated Andrew Higginson 4-2.
Gary Wilson complained of his "absolutely useless" performance in his 4-3 win over Joe O'Connor in a rerun of last year's final, and Rory Thor defeated Ashley Carty 4-3.
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