English duo Martin O’Donnell and Chris Wakelin moved onto the next stage of Championship League Snooker on Tuesday in Leicester.
The pair topped their respective groups in Stage 1 of the season-opening ranking event at the Morningside Arena.
Wakelin, the Snooker Shoot Out champion from last term, won two out of his three round-robin ties from Group 21 to finish in first place.
The 31 year-old beat Liam Pullen and Anton Kazakov while dropping just one frame to guarantee his safe passage through to the last 32, leaving his 3-0 defeat to Oliver Lines towards the end of the day largely redundant.
- CLICK HERE: New season begins despite live scoring issues
In Group 11, O’Donnell went undefeated as he marked his return to the professional scene in style.
The 37 year-old regained his tour card through strong performances on the Q Tour last season, and he’ll be looking to build on that during this campaign.
After a 3-0 victory over Aaron Hill, O’Donnell secured a crucial draw with pre-group favourite Hossein Vafaei of Iran.
O’Donnell subsequently overcame amateur top-up Fergal Quinn to safeguard his place in the next stage of the competition.
Wakelin and O’Donnell will have to wait several weeks to compete again in the Championship League, which takes a mammoth four weeks to complete.
On Wednesday, two more groups will be undertaken with Ryan Day entering the fray alongside Michael White, Himanshu Jain, and Jiang Jun in Group 10.
In Group 22, meanwhile, Scottish Open runner-up Joe O’Connor will be joined by Robbie Williams, Zak Surety, and amateur Alfie Davies.
Stage 1 draw
| Group 1 (July 10) | Group 2 (July 11) | Group 3 (June 26) | Group 4 (July 12) |
| Ronnie O’Sullivan | Judd Trump | Shaun Murphy | |
| Scott Donaldson | Xu Si | Tian Pengfei | |
| Rod Lawler | Jimmy White | Lukas Kleckers | |
| Alfie Burden | Reanne Evans | Ashley Carty | Andrew Pagett |
| Group 5 (June 29) | Group 6 (June 30) | Group 7 (July 6) | Group 8 (July 7) |
| Kyren Wilson | Mark Williams | Ali Carter | Robert Milkins |
| Andy Hicks | Dylan Emery | Jackson Page | Dominic Dale |
| Asjad Iqbal | Ken Doherty | Long Zehuang | Muhammad Asif |
| Louis Heathcote | Thor Chuan Leong | Ryan Davies | Alex Taubman |
| Group 9 (July 14) | Group 10 (June 28) | Group 11 (June 27) | Group 12 (July 12) |
| Gary Wilson | Ryan Day | Barry Hawkins | |
| John Astley | Michael White | Zhang Anda | |
| Mink Nutcharut | Himanshu Jain | Martin O’Donnell | Sanderson Lam |
| Ma Hailong | Jiang Jun | Jamie O’Neill |
| Group 13 (July 13) | Group 14 (July 14) | Group 15 (July 4) | Group 16 (July 3) |
| David Gilbert | Ricky Walden | Stuart Bingham | Jimmy Robertson |
| Yuan Sijun | David Lilley | Matthew Stevens | Ben Woollaston |
| Sean O’Sullivan | Peng Yisong | Allan Taylor | Liam Graham |
| Ishpreet Singh | Liu Hongyu | Duane Jones | Peter Lines |
| Group 17 (July 5) | Group 18 (July 11) | Group 19 (July 10) | Group 20 (July 8) |
| Zhou Yuelong | Joe Perry | Noppon Saengkham | Matthew Selt |
| Ashley Hugill | Jamie Clarke | Mark Davis | James Cahill |
| Oliver Brown | Andy Lee | Jenson Kendrick | Andres Petrov |
| TBC | Stuart Carrington | Ross Muir | Sydney Wilson |
| Group 21 (June 27) | Group 22 (June 28) | Group 23 (July 7) | Group 24 (July 6) |
| Chris Wakelin | Joe O’Connor | Fan Zhengyi | Pang Junxu |
| Robbie Williams | Sam Craigie | Wu Yize | |
| Zak Surety | Fergal O’Brien | Hammad Miah | |
| Alfie Davies | Ahmed Aly Elsayed | Stan Moody |
| Group 25 (July 8) | Group 26 (July 5) | Group 27 (June 30) | Group 28 (July 4) |
| Si Jiahui | Jak Jones | Jordan Brown | Anthony Hamilton |
| Mark Joyce | Jamie Jones | Julien Leclercq | Ben Mertens |
| Mohamed Ibrahim | Rebecca Kenna | Marco Fu | Ryan Thomerson |
| Haydon Pinhey | Dean Young | Barry Pinches | Xing Zihao |
| Group 29 (June 29) | Group 30 (June 26) | Group 31 (July 13) | Group 32 (July 3) |
| Thepchaiya Un-Nooh | Cao Yupeng | Xiao Guodong | |
| Elliot Slessor | Lyu Haotian | Martin Gould | |
| Victor Sarkis | Daniel Wells | Ian Burns | Alexander Ursenbacher |
| Florian Nuessle | Steven Hallworth | Rory McLeod |
Featured photo credit: WPBSA
As you say, the drama fizzled out. Both group winners were decided before the final match, and indeed the Wakelin-Lines match was completely unnecessary – the four group positions were already determined. Maybe they can address this next year.
It was good to see Liam Pullen get his first win. He looked much more relaxed as the day went on. Other players, such as Lines, Vafaei and sometimes Wakelin, looked a bit rusty.
Today we see another interesting ‘rookie’: Jiang Jun. He’s an ‘unnatural’ left-hander from Ji’an in Jiangxi province (close to Yushan and Nanchang, hometown of Yuan Sijun and Luo Honghao). He’s just 17, with a good all-round game and steady temperament. However, last week he was playing a Pro-Am in Guangzhou (he lost in the final), so may be underprepared for his first match in the UK.
Alfie Davies (not Davis, as on the CL website) is also quite a decent player, 22 years old. He had some good results on the amateur circuit in Wales last season, and is steadily improving.