Scottish Open: Luca Brecel battles through to avoid scare against James Cahill, comfortable win for Ding Junhui

ByEurosport

Updated 12/12/2023 at 18:02 GMT

Luca Brecel admitted after his 4-3 win over James Cahill that it was a "strange game" as both players really struggled to find any kind of fluency at the table. Even though Brecel made two centuries against his giant-killing opponent, both he and Cahill made a number of errors. At one stage, Cahill looked destined to take the win, but a final error gave Brecel the chance for the win.

Brecel reflects on 'strange, entertaining game' after victory over Cahill

World champion Luca Brecel battled through to beat James Cahill 4-3 at the Scottish Open on Tuesday to avoid an almighty scare.

Brecel had to dig deep, at one stage going nearly a frame and a half without even potting a ball as Cahill started strongly.

However, when coming to the table in the second frame 53-0 down, the world champion made a break of 62 to level things up.

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He then followed that up with a beautiful break of 127 to move into the lead. Cahill, commonly known as 'The Giant-Killer', bounced back and levelled things up by taking a scrappy frame after Brecel saw the white go in by accident.

The fifth frame was somehow littered with even more errors, particularly once the colours and then the yellow had been potted, with both players really struggling to take control of the situation.

At 43-30 down, Cahill finally sunk the green and managed to get the blue on the bottom cushion. He then potted the pink and black to take a 3-2 lead.

'What a way to finish!' - Brecel wins decider with 133 total clearance

It looked like Cahill was set to take the win when he was at the table with the balls in a good position, but yet another error opened the door for Brecel, who did well to clear up and force a decider.

Brecel once again got back to the table, and he managed to clear up, knocking in his second century of the match with a 133 break, and thereby booking his place in the next round

It also means that Brecel keeps his chances of qualifying for the World Grand Prix alive.

"Very entertaining," Brecel said when reflecting on the match with Eurosport's Alan McManus. "Strange game, the two of us were always a small detail away from winning the frame, then something happened and the other guy game back.

"It was a strange game. I left myself a bad angle on a red [when he went 3-2 down] and just 1cm can change a whole game, it's so strange. In the end, I thought I played quite well and I felt good."

Elsewhere on the tables, there were 4-1 wins for Noppon Saenghkam and Pang Junxu, who beat Lukas Kleckers and Xu Si, respectively.

Meanwhile, Ricky Walden battled back from 3-2 down, knocking in breaks of 71 and 75, as he beat Alexander Ursenbacher.

In the earlier games, it was a trio of victories for Chinese players, headlined by UK Championship runner-up Ding Junhui, who beat Jenson Kendrick 4-1.

Ding knocked in two half-century breaks as well as a ton of 115 as he powered away from 1-1 against Kendrick to ease to victory.

The other two victories were both whitewashes as Lyu Haotian reduced Jackson Page to just 58 points as he triumphed 4-0.

19-year-old rising star Liu Hongyu recorded the other 4-0 win, knocking in breaks of 73 and 70 as he saw off Zak Surety.

Sanderson Lam was the other winner from the morning session, winning 4-1 against Cao Yupeng despite watching his opponent record a mammoth break of 140.

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