China Open Daily News - Day Two
If there are nine million bicycles in Beijing, there must be ten million taxis, writes Neil Tomkins, Global Snooker's Man on The Spot
Ricky Walden extended his unbeaten run in China this season to eight matches with a convincing 5-2 win over Joe Perry.
Walden hit the ground running with an immaculate 140 break in the first frame.
Perry never seemed settled and frequently got upset with the crowd and their cameras! If they were playing at Wimbledon, 'Gentleman Joe' would surely have earned a code violation for 'Cue Abuse' as he threw his extension to the ground.
Defending champion, Stephen Maguire and crowd favourite John Higgins were both 4-0 down at their mid-session intervals. Maguire’s day was topped off as Dave Harold fluked the black to cap a 5-0 whitewash.
Higgins on the other hand, nearly raised the roof as he made break after break to come back and win 5-4 against Anthony Hamilton.
Hamilton had salt rubbed into his wounds by an enthusiastic Chinese fan at the stage door, who kept repeating the words “four zero, four zero”.
In the evening, all eyes were on local favourite, Ding Junhui. High expectations are placed on the shoulders of former champion every time he plays in front of his adoring home crowd.
Tonight, though he faced one of the young pretenders to his crown. Xiao Guodong, who Global-snooker.com readers will be familiar with from our PIOS coverage, is an exceptionally talented 19-year-old.
Xiao got off to the best start, and entertained the Beijing crowd with Whirlwind style shots to finish off frames two and three. Although Ding threatened to get back into the match, Guodong caused a major shock as he moved into the last-16.
On the next table, Jamie Cope started well but faded fast as Ryan Day turned the screws with a solid break-building performance, that included a couple of outside chances of maximums.
Nigel Bond arrived at the venue and needed a police escort from the courtesy car to the entrance. Scenes that would be more associated in the UK, with the arrival of another Bond.
Allister Carter had no problems against Bond, with a 5-0 win in quick time.
The language is a real barier in Beijing, but we did meet one friendly fan who was able to speak English.
He got quite animated at one point, saying that I looked the famous snooker player, Stephen...Maguire. Phew! I thought for a minute he was going to say…Hendry!
In the practise room, a ‘friendly’ cueing challenge between Shaun Murphy and Ryan Day was settled, when Shaun’s manager, Brandon Parker, took the cue and showed them both how it was done!
We went for a chinese tonight... the first restaurant though clearly wasn't aimed at the western palette. On the menu was chicken intestines and duck blood and they were the more appetising options!
See ya tomorrow…
