Friday 15 July 2011

Snooker: England, NI in WC quarters

Snooker: England, NI in WC quarters

England and Northern Ireland both qualified for the World Cup quarter-finals on Thursday.
Ali Carter won both his singles matches as he and Mark Selby beat India 4-1 to move England into the last eight.
"At the start of the tournament our aim was to get out of the group and it looked tough on paper but we've done it quite easily," Selby told World Snooker's official website.
"It wasn't pretty to watch but it's the result that counts. We wanted at least 4-1 and got 4-1."
Northern Ireland had earlier become the first team to reach the quarter-finals in Bangkok.
The Northern Irish pair of Mark Allen and Gerard Greene had victory tied up before 16-year-old Luca Brecel fired in a 100 break to beat Mark Allen in the final frame, and leave the winning margin at 3-2.
Brecel has been tipped as a future major player in the sport for several years already and he impressed established tournament contender Allen.
"Stephen Hendry did a few exhibitions with him and he talked highly of him," said Allen.
"If Hendry talks highly about someone of that young age then you know he's doing something right."
Allen and Greene had done enough to edge past Brecel and Bjorn Haneveer though, as the Northern Irishmen's third victory in three matches carried them through to the last eight.
England and Northern Ireland now meet on Friday to determine who tops Group A. The pool winners will likely avoid Scotland in the last eight.
The Scots had to come from 2-1 behind to beat Thailand II on Thursday evening with John Higgins and Stephen Maguire both posting wins in the reverse singles.
Higgins admitted the pair had "got out of jail" but the victory means they need just one frame against Hong Kong on Friday to secure their progress.
Wales, represented by Mark Williams and Matthew Stevens, are likely title contenders.
They also won a third straight match but let a 3-0 lead slip to beat Pakistan only by a 3-2 margin.
Williams said: "It's another win but the way you get through is by the number of frames you've won and match wins sort of don't count.
"We were 3-0 up and could have nicked one of the last ones and guaranteed it.
"A few things could happen but we won't know until tomorrow [Friday] what we have to do and we might not have to do anything.
"We could play (Republic of) Ireland tomorrow [Friday] and win 4-1 but we could also lose 4-1. If it was the best of nine we would thrash them."
The Irish remain on course to qualify after edging out Germany 3-2 in the final match of the day. Ken Doherty kept his nerve to win the decider.
Earlier, Afghanistan registered their first ever World Cup win, beating Poland 4-1.
Afghanistan's Mohammad Saleh said: "In Afghanistan snooker is a new game but we have a lot of talent. Our association supports us and we have a lot of young players playing from 10 in the morning to eight in the evening with more than 100 clubs in Kabul."
Tony Drago found some vintage form as rapid breaks of 100 and 70 in his two singles frames helped Malta beat United Arab Emirates 5-0.
"I'm very emotional with the way we played and I can't tell you how proud I am," Drago said.
China beat Australia 3-2 to maintain their 100 per record but the result keeps both sides in with a chance of overhauling Malta and qualifying from Group B.

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