Doherty eyes title after outsmarting Dott

Ken Doherty is only one match away from his first ranking title in almost five years after he stormed past Graeme Dott 6-3 in the first semi-final of the Malta Cup at the Hilton Conference Centre yesterday.

The bubbly Irishman recovered from a slow start to power his way through to his first ranking final of the season after another impressive display of precise potting and tight defensive play. His opponent in today's final is John Higgins who late last night beat Dominic Dale 6-3.

Victory this evening will hand Doherty the sixth ranking title of his career since he started playing at top level in 1990 following victories at the Regal Welsh in 1993 and 2001, the 1997 World Championship, the Rothmans GP here in 2000 and the Thailand Masters in 2001.

His win over Dott will move him up to fourth in the world ranking list to be published tomorrow by the World Snooker Association.

"I'm absolutely delighted to have at last reached a final of a ranking event after such a long spell," said Doherty, whose last appearance in a major tournament final goes back to the 2003 World Championship when he lost to Mark Williams 17-16.

"I struggled a bit at the beginning but after I won the second frame I settled down and started to play more flowing snooker. The most important thing in these kind of matches is that you play some solid snooker and I think I've done that especially when it came to play safety shots.

"I have already won five ranking titles in my career, but I'm certainly still hungry for more. Obviously every time I play in a tournament, my objective is to win but that is not possible to happen every time," Doherty remarked.

"It has been a long time since I have played so well and I just hope that tomorrow I can play to my full potential because when I'm at my 100 per cent I'm certainly a match for anybody."

For Dott, yesterday's defeat was another disappointment as the 28-year-old Glasgow-based player is still in search of his first ranking title of his career since he turned professional in 1994. He was a runner-up in the 1999 Regal Scottish, the 2001 British Open, the World Championship in 2004 and more recently, he lost last year's Malta Cup final to Stephen Hendry.

"It's very frustrating to arrive so close to your target and then, for some reason or other, I end up losing," Dott said.

"My performance today was very poor to say the least. Many say that one of my main weapons is my defensive game but today it was simply non-existent. I failed to play one single decent shot at crucial stages of the match and certainly you cannot win such important matches with that kind of display."

Prior to yesterday's semi-final, Doherty and Dott had met on four other occasions with the Irishman leading 3-1 and the last meeting dating back to the 2003 World Championship. On that occasion, Doherty won a thrilling match 13-12 that set him on his way to reach the final which he eventually lost to Williams.

The opening two frames of yesterday's semi-final might have given the impression that we were set for another marathon match between Doherty and Dott, just like the 1999 Regal Scottish Open semi-final when the Scott sneaked through having won the decider after more than three and a half hours play.

In fact, the first frame was characterised by a series of defensive shots as both Dott and Doherty refused to take any risks. It took more than 51 minutes for Dott to win the frame 71-43 and claim an early advantage.

Doherty got back on level terms in the second frame after clearing the final colours. The Dubliner seemed to finally find his rhythm as he started to exert his authority winning the next two frames and rolling in a fine break of 98, in the fourth.

After the restart, Doherty successfully managed to keep Dott off the table, extending his lead to 4-1 with runs of 50 and 44 .

Dott, who has earned a reputation for fighting back in tough situations, tried to cling on to the match by winning the next frame to bridge the gap to 4-2.

But Doherty was hitting top gear now and he produced some fine snooker on his way to compiling his first century of the match, a 119, to move one frame away from victory.

There was no margin of error now for Dott who initially kept control of his nerves to win the eighth frame. But the world no. 30 finally cracked in the following frame as a poor defensive shot paved the way for Doherty to win the frame 65-3 and the match 6-3.

Yesterday's results: K. Doherty vs G. Dott 6-3; J. Higgins vs D. Dale 6-3.

Today's final: K. Doherty vs J. Higgins. First session: 3 p.m. Second session: 7 p.m.