Day shines in final to move into Winners' Group - 01/03/2011

GROUP SIX LATEST SCORES (FIRST TO 3)
TABLE ONE - MARK KING 0-2 STEPHEN LEE
TABLE TWO - MARK DAVIS 0-3 MATTHEW STEVENS

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RYAN DAY, who only came into the 2011 Championship League after Marco Fu decided to skip Group 5 in favour of returning to Hong Kong, beat Mark Allen 3-0 to book himself a place in the final group.

The Welshman sealed his play-off spot with two wins earlier in the day against Ding Junhui and Ricky Walden, and then came from behind to beat Liang Wenbo in the semi-final.

Day then put in a great performance to beat Northern Irishman Mark Allen 3-0 in the final, after trailing in all three frames, 52-1, 58-6 and 34-0 respectively.

The win was a high spot in what has been a poor season for Day; “I’ve not played very well at all over the last two days and was a bit lucky to still be in it at the knockout stages but the final was the best match I played.

“I’m just trying to get as many matches played as possible and trying to get some self-belief and confidence back.

“It has been very frustrating as I’ve been losing a lot of matches to players that I would never have dreamed of losing against a couple of seasons ago.

“I was meant to be in Group Seven but this was a good opportunity to play a few matches and earn a few bob so now I’ll just try to keep it going.

“Everyone wants to play in the Premier League and it’s something everyone watches on Thursday nights so to be involved in that would be fantastic.”

Day earned £6,200 for his efforts while Allen took home £4,750 and returns tomorrow to compete in Group 6.

Earlier, both finalists were involved in tight semi-final matches that went all way to deciders as Allen beat Mark King and Day put paid to Liang Wenbo’s Championship League dreams.

Allen had opened up a 2-0 lead with breaks of 120 and 101 but the gritty King levelled it. A run of 67 in the decider sealed it for the Northern Irishman. Day had come from 2-1 down against Liang Wenbo; runs of 53 and 47 in the final two frames giving the Welshman the edge.

Both Liang and King return tomorrow for Group 6, £3,000 and £3,150 to the good respectively, and they will be joined by 2009 winner Judd Trump, Stephen Lee and Mark Davis.

There are seven players competing in each Championship League Snooker Group and they each play the others once, with a point for a win. All matches are the best of five frames.

Players earn £100 per frame won. The top four players after the remainder of the group matches tomorrow then play in best of five semi-finals. The money increases to £300 per frame won and the winner receives £3,000, the runner-up £2,000 and the beaten semi-finalists £1,000 each.

The winner then goes through to the final group on March 23rd & 24th where big money as well as a spot in the Sky Sports-televised Premier League Snooker is up for grabs.

The two bottom players are eliminated from the competition, while the remaining four move forward to Group Three at the end of January to be joined by three new players.

Already through to the final group are Mark Williams, Mark Selby, Ali Carter and Shaun Murphy.