World Championship – Day 7 – Robertson first player through to quarter-finals

Neil Robertson beat David Gilbert 13-9 to become the first player with a secured spot in this year’s World Championship quarter-finals.

 

Although the match started with Gilbert taking a surprising 3-1 lead by the end of the first session Robertson was leaving no doubts of who’s in charge of the match with breaks of 84, 106, 57 and 131 for a 5-3 scoreline.

 

At returning for the second session, the Australian extended his lead at 6-3, Gilbert taking the next two frames to try and catch up with his opponent.

 

But the breaks marathon of 76, 77, 82 and 92 were putting Robertson 10-5 ahead, the Englishman only managing to pull back a frame as the session was coming to an end.

 

The final encounter started in the same way like the previous one, with Robbo winning the first frame and Gilbert the next two ones, but this time a break of 60 points was turning the scoreline into 12-9, Neil needing one more frame to win.

 

Gilbert tried the best he could to get back into the match a break of 67 helping him win the 21^st frame, but Robertson closed with runs of 44 and 43 to get his quarter-finals’ ticket.

 

In the other matches, Stephen Hendry took a considerable lead of 12-4 over the defending champion John Higgins after two sessions, Stephen Maguire put his nose in front against Joe Perry at 5-11, while Welshman Ryan Day ended his first session with Cao Yupeng at 6-2.