Alex Borg’s run in the qualifying phase of the World Championship came to an end yesterday following a 10-7 defeat to Englishman Jamie Cope.

Borg had reached the third stage of the pre-tournament qualifiers following victories over James Wattana, of Thailand, and Scotland’s Marcus Campbell but Cope proved to be a more difficult obstacle for the many time Malta champion who produced another spirited performance in Sheffield but to no avail.

The first session of the best-of-19 contest was shared with Cope enjoying a narrow 5-4 lead at the break. There was little between the two players but Cope went on to seal the victory to move one step away from a place at the Crucible Theatre next month.

Cope’s next opponent will be Mark King. The match will be played on Tuesday.

Elsewhere, six-time World Championship finalist Jimmy White enjoyed a run to the last 16 of the China Open last week, but struggled to replicate that form against Ian Burns, who rattled in breaks of 131 and 121 in winning eight of the last nine frames for a 10-4 victory.

Jamie Jones, who reached the quarter-finals in 2012, made an amazing comeback against Sheffield’s Joel Walker, recovering a 9-4 deficit to win 10-9 with top runs of 101, 70 and 60.

Malta Cup

Meanwhile, it emerged yesterday that World Snooker are showing interest in restoring the Malta Cup as a Professional Tour Championship (PTC) event in the future.

A campaign to attract sponsorships, also supported by Borg, has been launched.

One may obtain more details by contacting Jo Micallef at snooker@jomicallef.com or go to ‘We Love Snooker in Malta’ on facebook.

The PTC travels all over the world and this season expanded to countries like Bulgaria, Belgium, Poland, Germany and China.

The Malta Cup was a world ranking event between 2005 and 2007. The 2008 tournament, the last in the series, was a non-ranking competition. In the final at the Hilton Conference Centre, Shaun Murphy beat Ken Doherty 9-3.