Are the stars aligning for Ronnie O’Sullivan in Sheffield this year? O’Sullivan has avoided a brutal bottom half of the draw which has run true to form with former world champions Judd Trump, John Higgins, Mark Williams and Luca Brecel all reaching the last eight. In contrast, the top half has become a green baize bloodbath with Kyren Wilson, Mark Selby, Mark Allen and Neil Robertson all out.
‘I expected my opponent to play better’ – O’Sullivan feels Pang scoreline flattered him
No matter how you try to slice it, dice it or pot it, it is difficult to escape from the conclusion that the draw has opened up for Ronnie O’Sullivan at the World Championship in Sheffield.
O’Sullivan was seeded to face world No. 12 Zhang Anda in the last 16 at the Crucible and world No. 4 Mark Selby in the quarter-finals, two battle-hardened major ranking event winners, but has instead landed Pang Junxu and Si Jiahui.
Wins over qualifiers Ali Carter (10-4) in the first round and Pang (13-4) in the second round were impressive, but were probably helped by neither man reaching anything near premium form.
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O’Sullivan agreed with such an assertion when he told TNT Sports: “It was alright.
“I expected my opponent to play better, but he didn’t and he let me off the hook a lot of times, so the scoreline probably looked better than it was. It did not feel like a 13-4.”
While Pang, the world No. 27, and Si, the 2023 semi-finalist, are both exceptional rising talents from China, they surely do not provide the roadblock four-time Crucible winner Selby would have represented if he had been facing the seven-time champion on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Without being disrespectful to the ability of the men in the top half of the quarter-final draw, it is not loaded with the level of pedigree which confronts those in the bottom half, with world champion Kyren Wilson and Neil Robertson joining Selby and Mark Allen as early casualties in a veritable bloodbath of seeds.
O’Sullivan’s ‘Class of 92’ rivals John Higgins and Mark Williams, with seven world titles between them, meet in one quarter-final.
In a clash of arguably the two form horses of this year’s event, world No. 1 Judd Trump, the 2019 winner, faces the irrepressible attacking threat of Luca Brecel, the maverick powerhouse puncher from Belgium who romped to the crown two years ago.
