Ding Junhui in action during his first round match at The York Barbican
Ding Junhui in action during his first round match at The York Barbican

Neil Robertson & Ding Junhui win opening UK Championship games


Former UK Championship winners Neil Robertson and Ding Junhui made short work of their opening games to reach the second round of the 2018 tournament at York.

Australian Robertson, winner of the event in 2013 and 2015, beat Welshman Kishan Hirani 6-2.

The world number 10 produced five 50-plus breaks and a best of 110 in the fifth frame.

Chinese star Ding, like Robertson a two-time UK champion, coasted to a 6-1 victory over Poland's Adam Stefanow.

Jack Lisowski was the first man to progress to the second round and did so in style as his 6-1 defeat of China's Zhang Jiankang included two century breaks.

Lisowski compiled scores of at least 50 in six of the seven frames, setting the trend with an 82 in the opener and making breaks of 120 and 115 in the second and penultimate frames respectively.

Former world champion Ken Doherty was also in fine form in his 6-2 victory over Chinese teenager Yuan Sijun.

A break of 130 drew the Irishman level at 2-2 and he rattled off the next four frames with further scores of 50 and 82 in frames six and seven.

There were also first-round wins for Chinese pair Zhou Yuelong and Luo Honghao.

Tuesday November 27 Results

Afternoon session

  • Yuan Sijun 2-6 Ken Doherty
  • Zhou Yuelong 6-1 Soheil Vahedi
  • Michael Georgiou 0-6 Luo Honghao
  • Jack Lisowski 6-1 Zhang Jiankang
  • Lyo Haotian 4-6 Tian Pengfei
  • Martin O'Donnell 6-4 Xu Si
  • Ding Junhui 6-1 Adam Stefanow
  • Neil Robertson 6-2 Kishan H Hirani
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