UK Championship 2023 - Zhang Anda stuns Luca Brecel to reach quarter-finals, Hossein Vafaei wins through

ByThe Editorial Team

Published 30/11/2023 at 22:50 GMT

World champion Luca Brecel crashed out of the 2023 UK Championship as the in-form Zhang Anda beat the Belgian 6-4 to reach the quarter-finals. Zhang faces Iran’s Hossein Vafaei in the last eight on Friday afternoon after he hit three centuries in a 6-1 destruction of Matthew Selt. Ronnie O'Sullivan is also into the quarter-finals but John Higgins crashed out in another big result.

World champion Luca Brecel was well beaten by the in-form Zhang Anda as the Chinese player progressed through to the 2023 UK Championship quarter-finals.

Zhang is in the form of his life after recently claiming his first ranking tournament at the International Championship on home soil and reaching the final of the English Open last month.

Brecel came into the match battling illness but started well, and he had fortune on his side as a fluke on a long red in the third frame helped put him 2-1 in front.

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But Zhang came roaring back as breaks of 51, 78 and 54 rolled off three consecutive frames to move 4-2 up.

Brecel responded to level at 4-4 thanks to a pair of half-century breaks, but any sense that Zhang would freeze as the finish line drew closer was emphatically dismissed.

A superb 124 clearance edged Zhang back in front, and he pounced after Brecel had the first opportunity to put the 10th frame to bed.

Zhang’s break of 68 left Brecel on the brink before a brilliant long-range pot from near the back cushion left the world No. 3 needing snookers.

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Iran’s Hossein Vafaei is next up for Zhang after he was in scintillating form with three centuries in a 6-1 destruction of Matthew Selt.

Vafaei, who shrugged off the distraction of a mid-match trip to the pub due to a fire alarm to see off seventh-seed Shaun Murphy in the first round, raced into a 5-0 lead courtesy of breaks of 132, 94 and 133.

Selt restored some pride to get on the board in the penultimate frame, but Vafaei fittingly secured victory with another clearance of 121 to book his place in the last eight in style.

Ronnie O’Sullivan also won through to the quarter-finals, but the Rocket was far from pleased with a tense 6-5 victory over Robert Milkins.

“There was no flow, I was mis-timing shots, I was butchering balls all over the gaff,” O’Sullivan told Eurosport.

The world No. 1 will next take on Zhou Yuelong, who defeated John Higgins 6-3.

Four-time world champion Higgins walked out midway through the final frame complaining of a distraction caused by the lights of a TV studio.

'Higgins is leaving the arena!' - Surprise as star walks off mid-match

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