Williams hits form

Williams - a world champion in 2000 and 2003 - will face Joe Perry in the quarter-finals on Saturday.

Williams won the first two frames of the night in 21 minutes against his fellow Welshman helped by a run of 71 in the second.

Dale picked up the third frame with a run of 90 only for Williams to win the next two frames courtesy of a sparkling effort of 104 - the 250th century of his career.

Dale made a 98 to make it 4-2, but Williams closed it out with an 85.

Williams, the world number three, is the highest ranked player left in the tournament after world number one John Higgins was forced to withdraw earlier on Friday due to the death of his dad John Sr to cancer.

World champion Neil Robertson lost 5-4 to Anthony Hamilton in the last 32 on Thursday.

"The two in front of me are out of the tournament now - in very sad circumstances for John and his family, who my thoughts are with of course," said Williams. "There's an opportunity here to look to make up some ground, but I can only think game-by-game."

Perry booked his progress with an unexpected 5-1 victory over world number seven Ali Carter.

Carter collected the opening frame with a 45, but Perry eased through in winning the next five frames with runs of 49, 39, 84 and 73.

Stephen Maguire revelled in a comfortable 5-0 thumping of Ricky Walden. The former UK champion will face fellow Scot Graeme Dott in the last eight.

"It was a bit of a shock to win by that scoreline really, Ricky is a good friend and it's quite hard to play against a friend," said Maguire. "But I am delighted with the way I played - I managed to get in early in the frames and although there weren't any big scores, I always felt in control."

Ding Junhui meets Mark Selby while Joe Swail confronts Marco Fu in the other quarter-finals.

The semi-finals will be staged on Saturday night with the final set to be played in front of a 2,500-capacity crowd at the Tempodrom in Berlin.