Alex BorgAlex Borg

Alex Borg reached the second qualifying round of this year’s World Championship after a thrilling 10-9 win over former top-16 player James Wattana, at Ponds Forge in Sheffield, yesterday.

Borg finished Tuesday’s opening session 4-5 behind and things did not look rosy yesterday as he trailed the Thailand professional 8-5 midway through the second session.

However, the multi-time Malta champion showed great character not only to come back level and then get in front 9-8, but also to keep hold of his nerves in the decider after Wattana had hit a break of 69 in the 18th frame to equalise at nine-all.

In fact, Borg then knocked in his best break of the match, a 61, on his way to a 92-0 win that saw him book his place in the next round and another best-of-19 match against Marcus Campbell bet-ween today and tomorrow.

The other Maltese player in the early rounds of the prestigious tournament, Tony Drago, failed to make progress after falling at the first hurdle following a 10-3 upset to Robin Hull.

The seasoned Finland campaigner was favourite to go through after starting the day in a healthy 7-2 lead. Drago did try to make a last-ditch attempt to get back in the reckoning but Hull fired breaks of 102 and 107 to seal his spot in the next round. His next opponent will be Tian Pengfei.

Meanwhile, Craig Steadman saw off Jak Jones 10-7 to earn a meeting with Steve Davis in the second qualifying round.

Davis is in danger of dropping off the main tour and needs to beat Lancashire’s world number 77 Steadman to boost his hopes of survival. Steadman came from 6-2 down to win eight of the last nine frames against Jones with top breaks of 61, 63 and 59.

There are three more rounds of qualifiers to go. The deciders for a place at the Crucible will be completed by Wednesday.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.