O’Sullivan And Murphy Cruise Into Last Eight With Higgins butEnd Of The Lines

Ronnie O’Sullivan and Shaun Murphy became the first two players to reach the quarter-finals of the UK Championship as they both recorded 6-2 victories at the York Barbican on Wednesday afternoon.

O’Sullivan saw off Matthew Stevens and has now lost just three frames in his four matches so far. The Rocket is chasing his sixth UK title and first piece of silverware since the Welsh Open last February, and in current form looks hard to stop.

He opened today with a break of 101, his sixth century of the tournament. Stevens levelled with a run of 74, and had chances in frame three but O’Sullivan took it by clearing from green to black. World number eight O’Sullivan then pulled away to lead 5-1 with top runs of 51 and 54. He had a chance to close out the match in frame seven but missed the final green when leading 42-37, allowing Welshman Stevens to pull one back. But it mattered little as O’Sullivan sealed the result in the next in three scoring visits.

Murphy ended the challenge of Chinese teenager Zhou Yuelong. After taking the first two frames with a top break of 79, Murphy was hauled back to 2-2 by his promising opponent. But 2008 UK Champion Murphy stamped his authority on the contest after the interval and won four in a row by firing runs of 96, 110, 80 and 79.

Marco Fu ended the run of Oliver Lines at the UK Championship with a 6-0 whitewash to reach the quarter-finals.

Exciting prospect Lines had beaten three players, including Judd Trump, to get this far but he was no match tonight for Hong Kong’s Fu, who goes through to face Jamie Jones or David Gilbert on Friday.

Fu has had a poor season so far, failing to progress beyond the last 32 of a ranking event before this week, but is now just two wins away from matching his run to the 2008 UK final.

The opening frame tonight came down to the colours and Fu was lucky to win it by fluking the brown. Lines had chances again in the second but couldn’t take them and Fu won it with a 46 clearance. Frame three came down to the pink, and after both players had failed to convert attempted pots, Fu knocked it into a baulk corner to go 3-0 up.

From that point the two-time ranking event winner grew in confidence and rattled through the last three frames with top breaks of 118 and 68, with Lines failing to score a point.

World number one Mark Selby earned a meeting with either John Higgins or Mark Allen by beating China’s Zhang Anda 6-1. Zhang won the opening frame before World Champion Selby took six in a row with top breaks of 90, 109, 50 and 100.

John Higgins stepped up his bid to win three tournaments within the space a month by beating Mark Allen 6-3 to reach the quarter-finals of the UK Championship.

Higgins won the China Championship and Champion of Champions in November – banking £300,000 in the process – and started December in the same vein with a fine display against Allen in York. In Friday’s quarter-finals Higgins will meet World Champion Mark Selby, and if he can come through that test he’ll be just two wins away from another piece of silverware and a fourth UK title.

The Scot won the opening frame today on the colours and the second with a break of 85. Allen stormed back to take three in a row with runs of 78, 105 and 65. Higgins took the next with a 101 for 3-3.

Allen had chances in frame seven but crucially missed the final yellow to a baulk corner, allowing his opponent to pot yellow and green then double the brown to a centre pocket, which proved enough to put Higgins back in front. And world number four Higgins went on to win the last two frames with breaks of 68 and 90.

Jamie Jones made it through to the fourth ranking event quarter-final of his career with a superb 6-2 win over David Gilbert. Neath’s 28-year-old Jones knocked out Ding Junhui in the previous round and kept his run going.

Breaks of 58 and 96 helped give the Welshman a 4-1 lead and he won the sixth frame with a long pot on the final black, having got the snooker he needed on the blue. Gilbert pulled one back before world number 39 Jones secured victory in a scrappy eighth frame. He now meets Marco Fu.

Luca Brecel reached his first ranking event quarter-final in ten months by beating Stephen Maguire 6-3 at the UK Championship.

Belgian’s 21-year-old Brecel will now face Shaun Murphy in the last eight – just as he did at the age of just 17 in 2012 when he lost 6-5.

Promising talent Brecel made a breakthrough at the German Masters in February when he reached his first ranking final, and he also got to the final of the Shoot-Out the following week. Since then he has struggled to reproduce the same form, until this fine run at the York Barbican.

The result means that Maguire will finish this tournament outside the world’s top 16 and will miss the Masters for the first time since 2004.

After losing the first two frames, Glasgow’s Maguire hit back with breaks of 101 and 112 to level the match at the interval. Brecel regained the lead in a scrappy fifth frame before Maguire’s 32 clearance made it 3-3.

A run of 61 helped Brecel take the seventh frame and he came from 32-0 down to win the next to lead 5-3. In frame nine, Maguire led 60-26 when he ran out of position with two reds left. He laid a snooker behind the black, but Brecel enjoyed a huge slice of luck as he escaped and knocked a red into a centre pocket. He took full advantage by clearing with 37 to clinch the result.

Mark Williams earned a showpiece clash with Ronnie O’Sullivan by edging out Liam Highfield in a tense finish. Highfield, who was seeking to reached the last eight of a ranking event for the first time, had leads of 3-2, 4-3 and 5-4 but couldn’t get to the winning line.

Both players had chances in the decider, Highfield crucially missing the last red along a side cushion when he trailed 31-60. Two-time UK Champion Williams potted the red which proved enough.