Tour Championship: Free snooker betting preview and tips from Richard Mann
The maiden voyage of snooker's newly-formed Coral Tour Championship begins on Tuesday and Richard Mann is keen to strike a bet in his outright preview.
Recommended bets: Tour Championship
2pts Neil Robertson to win the Coral Tour Championship at 15/2
The newly-formed Coral Tour Championship promises to be an event for the snooker purists, the top eight players in the one-year ranking list competing for a top prize of £150,000 in matches played over the best of 17 frames in the quarter-finals, best of 19 frames in the semi-finals, and the best 25 frames in the final.
That final will take place over three sessions, beginning on Saturday and finishing on Sunday, with the winner earning a huge pay day and as well the prestige of winning an event comprising exclusively of the current eight best players in the world.
In essence, the Tour Championship is an aperitif for the latter stages of the World Championship, with the main course coming next month, and whoever lifts the trophy on Sunday is sure to shorten dramatically for the Crucible showpiece.
Understandably, Ronnie O'Sullivan heads the betting at 6/4 following his victory at the Players Championship, his 10-4 defeat of Neil Robertston in the final memorable for a number of reasons.
While O'Sullivan produced a near-flawless display, shutting out the Australian for large periods, he also reached 1000 career centuries when closing out the match with a typically-brilliant break of 134 that sent the crowd into oblivion in scenes seldom scene in snooker.
It truly was an iconic moment for snooker fans and as has so often been the case, O'Sullivan was the centrepiece of it.
Having had a week to refresh while the likes of Stuart Bingham and Kyren Wilson were doing the hard yards at the Gibraltar Open last week, it would be no surprise to see O'Sullivan follow up, especially with such a healthy prize on offer and the opportunity to test himself and beat the best in the game.
Nevertheless, it will take some effort get himself back up again so quickly again having come down from the emotional high of the Players Championship and all that came in that final session in Preston.
He might just be vulnerable this week with his opening match coming against Bingham, who is playing beautifully at present and was much the best when winning in Gibraltar on Sunday, beating Ryan Day convincingly in the final.
A potential semi-final with Masters champion Judd Trump awaits the winner of that one and in truth, O'Sullivan's side of the draw looks particularly competitive.
On the other side, number one seed Mark Allen faces Kyren Wilson, the latter scraping into the event at the expense of David Gilbert, and this is another match that isn't the easiest to get a handle on.
Having enjoyed a brilliant start to the season, Scottish Open hero Allen has gone off the boil somewhat since Christmas while Wilson has enjoyed another solid campaign without quite bridging the gap to the likes of O'Sullivan and Trump.
The winner of the Allen/Wilson clash will face either Mark Selby or the aforementioned Roberston in the last four and I think the latter is overpriced in the outright betting at 15/2.
Following a couple of years where he wasn't quite at his best, Roberston has enjoyed a fine campaign this term with wins at the Riga Masters and the Welsh Open supplemented with runner-up finishes at the International Championship and, of course, the recent Players Championship.
Along with Trump, Robertson has been one of the form horses on the tour this side of Christmas and although comprehensively beaten by O'Sullivan in Preston, he numbered some high-class players amongst his victims on the way to that final and looks the wrong price in Llandudno given his form and the draw he faces this week.
Recent form certainly suggests that Robertston comes into the tournament in better shape than his quarter-final opponent, Selby, a three-time world champion but someone who has really struggled for results in the last few months.
As has so often been the case, Selby could easily find a new lease of life with the World Championship now only weeks away while the longer matches in Wales will certainly suit him better than the host of best of seven matches he has been forced to diet on for much of the campaign.
Nevertheless, you have to wonder just how badly Selby's confidence has been affected by so many reverses and Robertson's game looks in much better shape at this stage, both technically and mentally.
He is fancied to have the edge in that quarter-final match and with Allen and Wilson arriving here with different questions to answer, Roberston's path to the final might just be more straightforward than the betting suggests.
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