‘The Melbourne Machine’ Neil Robinson triumphed in Thursday’s session of 188BET Champion of Champions at Ricoh Arena, writes Ziad Chaudry.
The Romford-based Australian beat the impressively talented 15-year-old from China Yan Bingtao 6-3 in this evening’s Group 3 final.
The Ricoh is used to seeing big shocks and the latest came earlier in the day when Bingtao, the youngest player in the 16-man £300,000 Coventry tournament who incidentally won the world amateur championship last year at a tender age of 14, dumped 2005 world champion Shaun Murphy 4-2.
Robertson, the 2010 world champion, had a much easier afternoon with a 4-0 whitewash over Wellingborough’s Ruhr Open champion Rory McLeod.
It looked very much that at 4-1 Chelsea FC fan Robertson, the current world number 3 who earlier in the season won the Gdynia Open to qualify here, was going to have an early night but in frame six Bingtao, who is currently completing his education back in China before turning professional next season, came back from 26 points down for a tidy 41 break to reduce the arrears to two frames.
It soon became one when a resurgence Bingtao combined breaks of 39 and 73 but Robinson’s mini slump proved to be a blessing in disguise as he responded superbly in frame eight with a superb 93.
He rubberstamped his semi-final place, where on Saturday he will play last night’s Group 1 winner and friend Joe Perry, who incidentally is an Arsenal FC fan, with a match-winning 50 break.
“I was on a bit of a hiding to nothing there, playing somebody so young,” said Robertson. “He had nothing to lose and I am very pleased to get through. I can relax a bit now and focus on the rest of the tournament.
“I thought Yan competed really well in the safety department that is where I thought I would have an advantage. He did really well.
“The one-table setup is absolutely brilliant. We don’t get many opportunities to do that unless you get down to the semi-finals of a ranking event. It is a great tournament, similar to the Masters where the first round is one-table, and the crowd was fantastic tonight.
“Joe has been giving me a lot of stick about the Chelsea results so that will give me some extra motivation for Saturday for sure.”
Friday's sessions sees the conclusion of the group stages where the current world number one from Leicester Mark Selby, Stephen Maguire, Barry Hawkins and Mark Allen all battle to claim that final semi-final spot.
2014 world champion Selby, otherwise known on the table as ‘The Jester from Leicester’ and Glaswegian Maguire kicks off the afternoon’s Group 2 proceedings at 1pm followed by Hawkins and Northern Irishman Allan, with the winners meeting later at 7pm.
Tickets are available on the day, otherwise catch all the action on ITV4 from 12.45pm.