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World no.17 and former Crucible finalist Ali Carter got his Betfred.com World Snooker Championship 2012 campaign off to a great start beating an ill Mark Davis 10-2. Neil Robertson also got his 2nd round match against Dave Gilbert off to a good start, he leads 5-3 overnight.

UK Champion Judd Trump managed to come from behind to beat Dominic Dale 10-7 fighting off food poisoning and Mark Selby became the eighth seed to drop out the tournament after suffering a surprise 10-3 defeat at the hands of Barry Hawkins.

Former Crucible quarter-finalist Ryan Day has had the worst couple of years of his professional career lately having slid sharpy down the rankings. But from 6-9 down to Ding Junhui he came back to win the match 10-9 at the World Snooker Championship.

2006 champion Graeme Dott suffered a 'snooker nightmare' and lost 10-1 to Joe Perry at the Betfred.com World Snooker Championship today. It was the biggest margin of loss in the tournament so far.

Another massive shock at the World Snooker Championship as the world no.19 and former Welsh Open finalist Andrew Higginson has defeated Stephen Lee 10-6 to reach the last 16 of the tournament for the first time in his career.

Reanne Evans has ended her 'up and down' season with a record eighth successive women's world snooker championship title, beating Maria Catalano 5-3 in the final at the Cambridge Snooker Centre.

Mark Allen has released a statement following his recent negative comments about fellow players, specifically his Chinese opponent Cao Yupeng which he branded him and his countrymen 'cheats'.

Three-times world champion Ronnie O'Sullivan got over the first hurdle at the World Snooker Championship today as he beat China Open champion Peter Ebdon 10-4 to reach the last 16. Judd Trump & Ding Junhui also started their Crucible campaigns today.

Former world champions Steve Davis, Shaun Murphy, Peter Ebdon and a host of other snooker players, managers and officials will be running the Sheffield half marathon on May 27th to raise money for the Paul Hunter Foundation.

First photo gallery from the Betfred.com World Snooker Championship 2012 at the Crucible Theatre, Sheffield. Features photos of Andrew Higginson, Stephen Lee, Matthew Stevens & Marco Fu.