Higgins German Masters qualifiers
Snooker Headlines, Ranking

John Higgins Loses in German Masters Qualifiers

The Scot won’t feature at the venue stages of the ranking event in January.

Noppon Saengkham compiled a brace of century breaks as he outplayed John Higgins in the German Masters qualifiers in Cannock on Saturday.

The latter was hoping to bounce back from his narrow defeat in the final of last week’s Northern Ireland Open but ended up losing the last four frames in a 5-2 defeat to the Thai.

Somewhat strangely for a player of his calibre, Higgins has often struggled in the German Masters with no last-eight appearances to his name and this reverse representing the fourth time he has exited in the qualifiers since 2011.

Elsewhere in the first round, Jimmy White squandered 4-2 lead to eventually go down in a decider against Ryan Day while Shaun Murphy thrashed Mark King 5-1.

China’s Cao Yupeng continued his decent return to the Main Tour with a 5-2 success against Robbie Williams, and there were victories too for Welsh pair Jak Jones and Jamie Clarke, Norway’s Kurt Maflin, and English amateur David Lilley.

Meanwhile, Mark Allen prolonged his hot streak of form by winning his second qualifying-round encounter against Sunny Akani to ensure that he will feature at the Tempodrom in the new year.

Last week’s champion in Belfast contributed breaks of 133, 95, 73, and 72 as he fought back from 2-0 behind to prevail by a 5-3 margin.

There were upsets in the other afternoon fixtures, however, with former champion Ali Carter crashing out against Lyu Haotian and 2021 finalist Jack Lisowski failing against Liam Highfield.

Fan Zhengyi was the other player to advance after a nail-biting 5-4 victory over fellow Chinese competitor Lu Ning at the Chase Leisure Centre.

The action continues on Sunday with the likes of world champion Mark Selby, Ding Junhui, and Martin Gould entering the fray.

Live coverage is available on the Eurosport Player and Matchroom.Live.

Click here to view the draw

Featured photo credit: WST

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  1. Pingback: John Higgins Loses in German Masters Qualifiers • Snooker Site

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