By elliott West
As expected Day 3 at the World Cup in Wuxi didn’t disappoint and we were treated to a feast of international snooker.
Team Malta had to weather a tirade of pots by the Welsh squad of Ryan Day and Mark Williams with Williams potting faster than it takes for his tattoo ink to dry. Alex Borg, fresh from collecting his two year tour card at the Q School may be fifty in age years but he and his teammate, Brian Cini couldn’t translate Borg’s age figure into a a break comparison. Wales must have thought there were magnets on the pockets because everything they went for landed in the right bag. To be fair to Malta, they had very little table time but should have made more of the wafer thin chances that they did have. Wales were a class act and the Day/Williams partnership is just delightful to watch, reminding us once again of how many great players come out of this country. So Malta may be wise to give Tony Drago a call for some advice before their next match after this 4-1 drubbing. Mark Williams poured further salt into Malta’s wounds by finishing on a 127 break. 4-1 seems to be a familiar score line for Wales after achieving the same against India and Australia.
China B looked like they were in a ruthless mood against Switzerland with Liang Wenbo maybe wanting to get an earlier bus to his hotel. Play was all in China’s court with Switzerland never really getting started in the match and will have to do a lot better if they are to recover from this 5-0 loss. Meanwhile, Scotland were in fine cheer after their win against the UAE and were hoping to inflict a heavy win against their next opponents, Israel. The Israel side couldn’t even get going and play went totally Scotland’s way with a crystal clear, 5-0 win.
Belgium were also very impressive with a strong pairing of Luca Brecel and a fresh faced, 14 year old, Ben Mertens. I was very impressed by Ben and he is definitely a player to watch out for in the future. Mertens was cool, collected and not phased by Malaysia’s short bursts of play. Malaysia managed to muster up 1 point capturing a frame but in the end the Belgian team fired the winning shot with a 4-1 win.
Earlier in the day the Republic of Ireland with the magical pairing of Ken Doherty and Fergal O’Brien relived their magic of 21 years before with a 4-1 win over Northern Ireland’s Mark Allen and Jordan Brown.
Day 3 Results
Northern Ireland v Republic of Ireland 1-4
England v Iran 3-2
Hong Kong v Saudi Arabia 4-1
China A v Austria 4-1
Thailand v Poland 3-2
Norway v Germany 2-3
Wales v Malta 4-1
China B v Switzerland 5-0
Australia v India 2-3
Scotland v Israel 5-0
Belgium v Malaysia 4-1
UAE v Cyprus 3-2
