England’s Ali Carter will be hoping to rediscover that winning feeling when he competes in the China Open Qualifying on Tuesday. The 38-year-old ended 2017 with some early round defeats but he has since responded with a collection of solid performances in 2018. Carter only just made it out of Group 3 of the Championship League to progress to Group 4 before hitting his stride to defeat Judd Trump in the last-four and Shaun Murphy in the final in Coventry.
Murphy got revenge last week at the Masters in the first round but Carter’s confidence will be high as he prepares to take on China’s Chen Zifan. Carter is 1/5 to win, with Zifan 3/1, with Carter to win 6-2 available at odds of 7/2. Sam Baird is also in action on Tuesday and the Englishman will do battle with Soheil Vahedi in the afternoon session. Despite losing his last seven competitive matches, Baird’s ranking of 59 suggests he could have the upper hand over his Iranian opponent. Vahedi is also in poor form after losing his last six and he is priced at 13/10 to win, while Baird is 8/15 favourite.
Kyren Wilson is also back in action just a week after his Masters final defeat to Northern Ireland’s Mark Allen. Wilson is now up to 14th in the world rankings after his display and he will be expected to breeze through qualifying this week. The 26-year-old will come up against China’s Li Yuan, who has not won a competitive match since November. The final match of the afternoon session sees home favourite Cao Yupeng take on Kurt Dunham.
China Open Qualifiers odds available at Dafabet.