By elliott west
So the moment has arrived for this now invitational event to take place and in day one six matches took place. The early matches ended with definitive score lines with Shaun Murphy achieving a great win against Lyu Haotian, 6-1 and Jack Lisowski beat Wu Yize by the same margin. As for the televised matches, Barry Hawkins had a match on his hands when a reinvigorated Yan Bingtao matched his game in their slug to the end. Both players were exceptionally good and in the end it was right that this match should be decided in a final frame. In the end, Hawkins managed to find the something needed to win the match but this battle could in the end have gone either way. Barry must be relieved to have crossed the line first in this 6-5 epic.
The same can’t be said of Ali Carter who fell into the first round exit trap. His Chinese opponent Zhang Yi dominated the match and Ali was only able to capture three frames to avoid a heavy defeat. Perhaps the long plane journey had affected Carter’s play but on the day he wasn’t able to catch up with his opponent and before he knew it the match was lost and his opponent, Zhang had won, 6-3.
Elsewhere China’s snooker hero Ding Junhui was pitched against Zhao Jimbo. Although Ding had a comfortable 6-2 win, he did give his opponent multiple chances to capture frames but Ding was really saved because Zhao was nervous and inexperienced. Ding will have play a lot better if he is to progress in this tournament and an early exit would again question his desire to win. Hopefully this will be a reminder to Ding that he can’t be complacent and must bring his A game to the table. Stephen Maguire didn’t get that opportunity as perhaps his Six Reds victory had emptied the tank as on the day Maguire faded away in the match, only able to muster two frames in a 2-6 defeat against an in form Xiao Guodong.
