The fifth game day in 16 matches underdogs inflicted six defeats to favorites. This is alarming. Of the 16 seeded players, two are eliminated – Barry Hawkins and Robert Milkins. In such a difficult situation, I am starting to draw up the next forecasts.
The central match of the 1/16 final is easy to determine – John Higgins – Ali Carter. I agree that the leader of the current season Higgins looks like the favorite. He not only won two rating tournaments out of three this season, but is now showing confident play in York. Carter has not lost his class. Now he is strong because after serious trials related to the fight against cancer, he is not afraid of any collisions at the snooker table. And yet, in my opinion, Ali still falls short of his best previous game. I admit the victory of John and not with a minimum score.
Peter Ebdon made a lot of efforts to defeat Dominic Dale at four o’clock in the morning Kiev time. His rival Stuart Bingham had a more lenient regime. This circumstance, along with the fact that the world champion looked quite combat-ready in previous matches, allows us to count on Stewart’s victory. This option is quite suitable for a multi bet, which will also include the victory of Mark Selby over Jamie Jones with a minimum handicap (in other words, a bet on the fact that Jones does not win 5 frames or more). Selby has been very good in previous matches, in which he did not give a single frame to his opponents.