Ronnie O'Sullivan and Stephen Hendry were in defiant mood this afternoon as they powered their way into commanding 6-2 leads in their best-of-17 frame quarter-final matches at the Travis Perkins UK Championship in York.
O'Sullivan, a beaten finalist to Hendry in the British Open in Brighton two weeks ago, was in sparkling form against Quinten Hann, the unpredictable Australian. Hendry, the seven-time world champion, was equally too good for Barry Pinches, from Norwich, at the Barbican Centre.
Hann has been playing some of the best snooker of his life this week, but it made little difference to the `Rocket' who raced into a 6-0 lead. A 77 break in the opening frame of the day started the onslaught, which was quickly followed by a break of 55 in the next frame as Hann remained rooted to his seat.
O'Sullivan then took a scrappy third and followed up that success with two century breaks in succession, 104 and 137 respectively, taking his tally to 10 hundreds for the tournament so far
. Hann managed to keep the match alive, snatching the seventh frame with a spirited 63 break and then making sure of the last frame of the session in scrappy fashion. However, the man from Down Under knows he has his work cut out to try and book his place in the semi-final stages, especially with history counting against him. O'Sullivan has won all five of their previous meetings.
History has little bearing on the Pinches-Hendry showdown, for the pair have never played each other. And Pinches, who has been a professional for 14 years, seemed to struggle with the occasion as he immediately slipped behind to the heavy-scoring Scot. Hendry opened with a 75 break to take the first frame and then knocked in a fluent 55 to leave Pinches on the back foot.
And that impressive potting continued as Hendry added breaks of 96, 107, 62 and 46 to give himself an excellent chance of winning his second world ranking event within a month. Pinches kept his hopes alive by winning the fourth frame, riddled with mistakes, and the seventh of the session courtesy of breaks of 49 and 58 in the same frame. Hendry took the last frame, leaving him requiring just three frames for victory. O'Sullivan also needs three frames.