O'Sullivan on the ropes against Carter at World Championships

Ronnie O’Sullivan has twice beaten Ali Carter in the Betfred World Snooker Championship final but their second-round match is on a knife edge this year ahead of today’s final session.

The Rocket trails 9-7 ahead of this afternoon’s conclusion, although it could have been so much worse after he trailed 8-3 early on Friday night.

O’Sullivan has looked out of sorts for much of the tournament, and admitted he was embarrassed during parts of his first-round win against Stephen Maguire.

But the five-time champion gave himself a fighting chance by winning four of the last five frames against Carter – the 15th seed.

The winner goes on to join Mark Allen in the quarter-finals after he battled to a 13-8 win against Joe Perry.

The Northern Ireland potter was locked at 8-8 against Joe Perry but he won five frames in a row to make the Betfred World Snooker Championship quarter-finals for the first time in seven years.

With two-time defending champion Mark Selby knocked out a week ago, the top quarter of the draw has opened for Allen – and he took the first step to taking advantage by beating Selby’s conqueror Perry 13-8.

Thorn

It was far from plain sailing, with Perry, a former semi-finalist at the Crucible Theatre, a sharp thorn in Allen’s side but, where once he might have wilted and failed to get over the line, the Antrim ace accelerated when it mattered.

“I wanted to come in and be a bit more aggressive. I felt like I needed to go more shots, I was aggressive but I was sensible,” he said.
“I had one blue I missed but I played perfect snooker really. It is nice to finish the way I did with a hundred.

“There was a guy who out the ‘ton up’ sign up when I was on 20, and I said he was a bit premature but when I got there I said ‘you can out that up now’ and gave him a bit of stick.

“I felt very relaxed out there. You need to play great to beat Joe, he is no someone I overly enjoy playing. I had to go and play well, I am very happy.”

Allen was heading for a collision course with Selby in the second round before the defending champion bowed out early.

And although Allen stated he did not see it as an advantage, Perry, although a huge talent, is no longer on the same level as those at the very top of the game.

Despite that, he battled brilliantly to fightback to 8-8 ahead of the evening session but Allen reeled off the last five frames in just over an hour and a half, with breaks of 133, 74 and 122 the highlight.

“On my day I can beat anyone. I don’t want to get too carried away because we are only two matches in,” he added.

“To get back into the top 16 probably means you have to win a tournament these days so that would be nice.

“It is what it is, it gets you in the Masters but there are more than 16 top players out there now so if World Snooker have any sense then they will make it a top 32 at the Masters.

“Because there are so many top players that you can’t fit them all into the top 16. It is going to get tougher every year.

“Had I played like that in the qualifiers then I would have lost in the first round. You can’t have sessions like that, it is only going to go up and up the quality now.

“Ronnie has set the standard and whether anyone lives up to that I don’t know but everyone is capable of some great snooker at any one time.”

Watch the snooker World Championship LIVE on Eurosport and Eurosport Player with Colin Murray and analysis from Ronnie O’Sullivan, Jimmy White and Neal Foulds.