Ronnie O'Sullivan began his history-making bid with a 6-1 victory over Luke Simmonds at the UK Championship.
Six in a row for Ronnie
Ronnie O'Sullivan began his history-making bid with a 6-1 victory over Luke Simmonds at the UK Championship.
Simmonds took the first frame but O'Sullivan levelled, and when the defending champion took a tight third the match was as good as over.
O'Sullivan, looking to pass Steve Davis and win this title for a record-breaking seventh time, signed off with breaks of 118 and 112 to clear the first hurdle with ease.
But afterwards O'Sullivan said he felt "absolutely awful" and at one stage became concerned he might have to curtail his quest to become the first player to win the title seven times.
"At one point today I wondered if I was going to get through it," said O'Sullivan. "I couldn't focus on the balls - I just had to grind it out really and wait and see what happened.
"It felt like one of the hardest matches I've ever had to play. Every time I was on a shot I felt like I was going to feather the white because I couldn't focus. Every shot felt like a black ball in a world final."
O'Sullivan heaped praise on Simmonds, who has a job building carbon fibre body parts for cars, and who evidently does not fit his definition of one of the "numpties" whom he has frequently derided.
"Luke is better than most people on the tour," insisted O'Sullivan. "I can't believe he's a factory worker and he doesn't play much, because he's got more shots than 80 per cent of the players on the tour."
Barry Hawkins also won swiftly on Thursday afternoon, beating a poor Jamie Clarke 6-0 - the latter failing to muster a single 30-plus break - while Chris Wakelin beat Duane Jones 6-1.
Former UK Championship finalist Liang Wenbo, who lost to Neil Robertson in the 2015 denouement, crashed out in round one as Sam Baird edged their encounter 6-5.
Stevens holds on
Matthew Stevens edged through to the second round of the UK Championship courtesy of a 6-4 victory over Ross Muir.
The Welshman knocked in a century to take a 4-1 lead which he extended to 5-1 soon after, before Muir won the next three frames to hint at a comeback.
Stevens held his nerve, though, dominating the 10th frame to earn a clash with either Graeme Dott or Oliver Lines.
Xiao Guodong turned on the style to beat Sean O'Sullivan, back-to-back breaks of 107 and 126 earning him a 6-4 victory having trailed midway through the match.
Belgium's Luca Brecel was a 6-4 winner against Fan Zhengyi, Stephen Maguire beat Simon Lichtenberg 6-3, Yan Bingtao beat Lukas Kleckers 6-1 and Hossein Vafaei won the deciding frame to beat Ashley Hugill 6-5.
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