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Tempodrom, Berlin - February 1-5 2012
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PartyPoker.net German Masters 2012 - Day Three
Afternoon Session
Today's matches started at 2PM Berlin time so the players and officials got a decent rest. Great news when you have five-six days of snooker on the trot.
The first man through today was none over than the three-times world champion Ronnie O'Sullivan, fresh from his 4-0 down comeback against Andrew Higginson yesterday.
His opponent was Joe Perry who shocked the seeded Ali Carter 5-4 in their first round match. It went the way of the O'Sullivan in the first frame though, a great 110 break.
Perry hit back strong with a 63 break of his own in the second but after that it was all one way traffic for the Rocket as runs of 74, 39 and 123 gave him an impressive 5-1 win over the Cambridge pro.
'All credit to Joe. He is having a good season and is a solid opponent. He didn't make it easy for me.
'I'm pleased to play well in that match. You are only as good as your last match and i'm happy to get through' said O'Sullivan.
O'Sullivan's opponent in the quarter-finals is the Welsh Dragon Matthew Stevens who triumphed 5-1 earlier against the current BGC Masters champion Neil Robertson
Stevens took the first frame before Robertson came back to level the match. After that it was all one way traffic as Stevens made breaks of 86, 58, 89 and 69 to record a convincing win over the Australian.
'It's my best this season. Neil is the man in form, he gets to the latter stages of tournaments a lot. It's nice to have a result over one of the best players in the world
'Against Steadman there was pressure on me to win to stay in the 16 and I wanted the result so I ground it out. Today I scored heavily and I managed to punish Neil.
'It doesn't get any easier for me as I have O'Sullivan next. I was watching him earlier and he was scoring heavily but I am full of confidence and i've got nothing to lose tonight'. Said Stevens.
Shortly following him in victory was defending champion Mark Williams who from 4-1 up, fought off a fightback from Stuart Bingham to win 5-2 which included top breaks of 55, 92, 52, 66 and 68. He plays Stephen Lee in tonight's quarter-finals.
The last man through to the quarter-finals this afternoon was Shanghai Masters champion Mark Selby who came through a long encounter 5-3 against Graeme Dott.
The first two frames were shared then Selby won the next frame which went down to the colours. A break of 82 following by Selby and he was 3-1 up going in to the interval.
After that the frames were shared until it was 4-3 to the Jester who won on the pink to go through to play Shaun Murphy tonight.
'It was a strange match today, we both struggled. Sometimes you play really well and sometimes you don't, i'm just happy to get the win.
'It would be great to get to the final again, its a great tournament, great atmosphere and great crowds.
'I've still got a lot of work to do on my game. I've been struggling a little bit with my last few tournaments but hopefully this can kick start my season.'
Updated tournament draw
Evening Session
Stephen Lee caused one of the major upsets of the tournament tonight as he sent the defending champion Mark Williams crashing out at the quarter-final stage with a fine 5-3 win.
The first four frames were shared between the pair. Lee went 3-2 then 4-2 ahead before Williams came back to 4-3 before the 2008 Masters finalist came through a nervy eigth frame to win the match.
'I played ok in patches. We had to change the white because we felt we were getting some funny contacts, I think it went to Marks head.
'I definitely think that playing all the time has definitely helped me. I've had a bit of work done on my cue and i've hit the ball well in patches.' said Lee.
His opponent in the semi-final will be Ronnie O'Sullivan who after coming from 4-0 behind to beat Andrew Higginson in the first round hasn't looked back as he beat Matthew Stevens 5-3 tonight.
Playing on the outside table it took O'Sullivan a little longer than usual to get started as he found himself 3-1 down to Stevens.
He came back strong after th he mid-session interval and made contributions of 55 and 54 to win the match.
If O'Sullivan can beat Lee tomorrow then he will be back inside the top 16 provisionally at the expense of Ricky Walden and he will have less to do at the Welsh Open to guarentee his Crucible spot.
The most exciting match of the quarter-final was between Stephen Maguire and Judd Trump in where the Scot came through a nerve racking decider to win 5-4.
Trump started off in the best possible way with a break of 111 in the first frame and he added further runs of 91 and 53 to give himself a strong 4-2 lead.
Maguire hit back straight away with a break of 100 and sneaked through the next frame after leaving Trump snookered on the last red to force the decider.
Trump had a chance after scoring 52 to open the reds and keep the break going but ran out of position on the pink and failed to make contact with the bunch.
After failing to escape from the safety he put himself in, instead of putting Trump back in from the baulk. Maguire decided to knock the only red safe off the cushion and it payed off later as he produced one of the best 57 breaks under pressure to win the match on the final black.
'It was a great win but I should never have been 4-2 down in the first place. I gifted him frames several times, I felt like I had thrown the match away.
'Judd has been on a bit of a roll recently, you can tell the way he walks around the table that he fancies the job all the time.
'Me and Shaun have had a couple of battles over the years, we grew up together and we know each others games. Hopefully it will be nice and open.
His opponent tomorrow is recent BGC Masters finalist Shaun Murphy who fought off Mark Selby 5-3 with the help of top breaks of 67, 59, 64 and 85.
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