Stephen Maguire One Win From Coral Cup Bonus

The Scot is in line to complete a £250,000 windfall after beating the world champion on Wednesday.

Stephen Maguire’s 9-6 victory over Judd Trump means he’ll contest the Tour Championship final on Friday – with the Coral Cup bonus now firmly within his grasp as well.

The 39 year-old didn’t produce the kind of staggering display that he conjured up against Neil Robertson earlier this week.

Maguire compiled a record six century breaks against the Australian in the quarter-finals, but he relied more on his battling qualities as he overcame an out-of-sorts Trump.

The latter was the clear favourite having already etched his name onto six ranking event trophies throughout this term.

However, Trump struggled with the conditions and couldn’t discover his scoring prowess in the semi-final tie at the Marshall Arena.

The world number one had been in control of the Coral Series mini-rankings list following his success in the Players Championship before the coronavirus lockdown.

Victory over Maguire would have guaranteed the 30 year-old the £100,000 Coral Cup bonus from the series that includes three lucrative events.

Yet, it’s his opponent who now has the opportunity to usurp him, with the Glaswegian set to face either Mark Selby or Mark Allen in the title decider in Milton Keynes.

🗣 “It would be mega confidence”

Stephen Maguire beat Judd Trump tonight.

On Friday, the Scot will have the opportunity to claim total prize money of £250,000 – his biggest pay cheque – at the @Coral Tour Championship #CoralSnookerSeries pic.twitter.com/QevgaR6FzJ

— World Snooker Tour (@WeAreWST) June 24, 2020

In addition to the £100,000 bonus, Maguire would pocket £150,000 for a Tour Championship victory, meaning a jackpot worth a quarter of a million pounds could be heading into his bank account should he prevail in his last encounter.

Maguire boasts a brace of titles from this campaign already with wins in the Six Red World Championship and World Cup under his belt, but he hasn’t triumphed in a ranking tournament since 2013 and lost in the UK Championship final in December.

His progress this week is remarkable considering he wasn’t supposed to be involved in the first place, replacing Ding Junhui at the last minute after the Chinese number one withdrew from the competition.

Selby and Allen, who are each too far behind in the pecking order to challenge for the Coral Cup bonus, meet in the second semi-final clash on Thursday.

Live coverage of the Tour Championship in the UK and Ireland is on ITV4, while there are various other methods of tuning in around the world.

Click here to view the draw (Times: CET)

Featured photo credit: WST