Maguire Preparations Suffer Knock
Stehen Maguire’s Crucible preparations suffered a knock after losing to Anthony McGill in the quarter-final of the reinstated Scottish Professional Championship at the Lucky Break Club in Clydebank.
McGill, playing in front of his home crowd won a scrappy affair by five-frames-to-three and will now face 2006 world champion, Graeme Dott for a place in Thursday’s final.
The opening two frames were shared before the higher ranked of the two forced a 3-1 lead at the mid-session interval.
After the break, though McGill settled and was soon back on level terms at 3-3.
In frame seven, it was Maguire who got in first and looked set to go back in front but broke down on 40. McGill clawed his way back into the frame eventually stealing it on the colours to move within one frame of glory.
In frame eight, Maguire again looked on course to take the frame, this time failing on a break of 61.
The local boy came good to produce the shock of the Scottish Professional Championships so far.
McGill, whose red hair resembles a young Steve Davis has helped earn him the nickname of the ‘Tartan Nugget’ held his nerve and for the second frame in a row managed to claw his way back into the frame and took the last few colours for a hard-fought win.
After his win the twenty-year-old was delighted and said, "I'm delighted, I found myself three one down but the interval came at the right time and allowed me to settle down and I played well after the break. I managed to play well at the right times in the match and there was no use giving up, if you're going to get beat you might as well get beat trying."
He paid tribute to the magnificent crowd that were behind him all the way. He said, "This is my home club so they were all behind me and the support was great. The atmosphere helped me and to play well and a crowd with a good atmosphere gives me great confidence."
Maguire was naturally disappointed afterwards but accepted that the best man won in the end. He said, "He should have won 5-3 quite easily but he missed a red and gave me a half-chance and I blew it. At 3-1 I should have kicked on and I thought play well and you're safe but I wish there wasn't an interval because it seemed to help him."
He admitted McGill has a bright future ahead of him. He continued "I've always said he has class and he has a bright future ahead of him but I will forget about this and turn my thoughts to the big one next week."
In the other quarter-final the form book held up as Graeme Dott saw off the challenge of James McBain by five-frames-to-two in a scrappy encounter that saw the lower ranked player make the highest break of just 61.
Dott was a happy man afterwards, saying, "Any win is a good win. James is a good player so it was always going to be hard for me but the last long pot was good to keep my break going but I can do better than that."
Graeme also stressed the importance of cutting out the silly mistakes. He groaned, "I feel good but I'm making ridiculous mistakes that must be eradicated. I'm playing well in patches but I need to try and cut out the rubbish and I'll need to play better than that tomorrow to reach the final."
James was pleased with his overall performance but admitted he had chances to stay in the game towards the end. He said, "I thought it was close and I missed a few good chances to stay in it.
Graeme deserved the win in the end but the score-line didn't really reflect what was a close match and he only really pulled away in one of the frames and apart from that it was quite tense."
He expressed a sense of regret at the lack of heavy scoring in his play, saying, "I had a few chances but didn't score heavily enough and against someone of Graeme's quality it's not good enough and he will always punish you. However, it was a good way for me to end the season but he looks as if he can go all the way."
