Perry eliminates Drago 9-6

Tony Drago's UK Championship stride came to a halt last night when Joe Perry beat the Malta professional 9-6 in a second round match at the Barbican Centre in York.

Drago, 17th in the provisional world rankings, started the second session 5-3 down and looked all but conquered when 28-year-old Perry won the opening two frames of the evening to go 7-3 up.

The day before Drago was involved in a tight first-round 9-8 win over Rory McLeod but despite the tension he was not ready to quit that easy against Perry and pulled back to 8-6, potting some superb breaks in the process.

However, Perry, the 2001 European Open runner-up, then won the 15th frame to book a berth in the last 32 round against either Ken Doherty or Nigel Bond.

Meanwhile, John Parrott produced a nerveless clearance in the deciding frame to beat Barry Hawkins 9-8.

The former world champion trailed 4-0 in the first session and again looked set for an early exit yesterday when he fell 8-6 behind.

But he battled to level terms and then got the better of a tense 41-minute decider.

First round: Carter bt Haneveer 9-3; McCulloch bt Pettman 9-4; Green bt Swail 9-4; Dale bt Delaney 9-3; Wattana bt Hull 9-2; Parrott bt Hawkins 9-8; Henry bt Holt 9-7; O'Brien vs Selby 9-8.

Billiards - World Championship

Duncan Bezzina and Alex Borg had a difficult start to the IBSF World Championship, currently being played in Hyderabad, India.

Bezzina, in Group F, lost his opening match against England's Paul Bennett 3-0 but recovered well to beat Sri Lanka's N.N.G. Samarawickrama 3-1.

Borg, in Group A, suffered two identical 3-0 defeats, to U Kuam OO, of Myanmar, and Australia's Matthew Bolton.