Robertson aiming to come up trumps

Australia’s Neil Robertson faces a tricky start to his title defence when he faces China Open winner Judd Trump in the first round of the World Championship which start at the Crucible today.

Robertson became the first player from outside Britain and Ireland to win snooker’s holy grail since Canadian Cliff Thorburn in 1980 when he beat Graeme Dott in the final 12 months ago.

The left-hander from Melbourne described his date with in-form Englishman Trump as “one of the toughest draws a defending champion could ever have”.

The 21-year-old Trump made his Crucible debut as a teenager four years ago, but had failed to qualify again until this year.

“He’s always been capable,” Robertson, who is hoping to avoid joining a group of previous defending champions that includes Terry Griffiths, Steve Davis, Dennis Taylor and Dott, who all lost their first-round matches, said.

“He’s very attacking-minded. It’s going to be an open game.”

Robertson is by no means alone in being handed a tough first round draw.

Three-time champion John Higgins faces Stephen Lee, while another three-time winner, Ronnie O’Sullivan, comes up against Dominic Dale.

For Higgins, last year’s world championship was nothing short of a disaster.

He suffered a second round knock-out and was then the subject of a tabloid sting which accused him of agreeing to take a bribe to fix frames at an event in Kiev.

Higgins was cleared of the charge but was banned for six months for giving the misleading impression that he would be prepared to deliberately lose frames.

Since his return in November he has regained the world no.1 ranking from Robertson by winning December’s UK Championships, and following up in the Welsh Open in February.

The volatile O’Sullivan, who has tumbled to 10th in the world rankings, shocked organisers last week by saying he was pulling out of the event, only to retract his threat 24 hours later.

O’Sullivan is nothing if not unpredictable, but arrives at the Crucible on the back of a first round defeat to Ryan Day in the China Open. He has also pulled out of two major events, the Dhanghai Masters and the German Masters.

In other testing first round match-ups, Mark Williams faces fellow Welshman Ryan Day, and Ding Junhui, tipped by many to land his maiden world title, meets Jamie Burnett.