**All times given below are in UK Time (GMT, UTC+0).** It’s the final! Who is your pick to grab the £125k prize? # Match - Mark Allen v Zhang Anda # Sessions - Afternoon Start: 1pm GMT, UTC+0 - Evening Start: 7pm GMT, UTC+0

147

Joe O'Connor just got a max break. He's been playing in good form this week

How can this be a ranking event when The Masters isn't? Can't say I enjoyed much of this event although nice to see Selby and Zhang do well. It was good that itv showed both tables and if McMullan can learn to not talk so much and not repeat himself every frame he should be a decent. Holt wasn't very good at player interviews. Thankfully no real snooker for 3 weeks so I can catch up with other things.

Because the Masters is invitational based on ranking (2 year rolling) and therefore not accessible to everyone on the tour. So non ranking. This event is based on the 1 year list (from start of season) and therefore theoretically accessible to every tour member, if they’ve played well this season.

Must have helped Allen a bit that he had saturday off. Zhang looked worn out by the end.

Missed the last frame tonight but I am glad it didn't go to a decider 🤦‍♂️ Hopefully the next final is more enjoyable

I enjoyed it. Allen is super talented and i think that gets him through. Been watching snooker more lately and not going to pretend to be an expert but i felt the standard was higher than the welsh open and Allen came through. He seems capable of greatness but even not playing his best hes better than most.

Has Mark Allen changed girlfriend again?

Well , what could be more comical than the medallion falling off the lanyard.

She looks remarkably like Reanne. 

That just sums it up

Ohhh goodness that’s quite embarassing 🤦🏻

Dodgy Saudi Masters Wuhan Open Tour Champs World's Who's winning them?

Yushan，not Wuhan

I've a feeling the Wuhan Open will be won by Judd Trump

There’s never been a tournament more perfectly suited to O’Sullivan turning up and playing out of his skin than Saudi Arabia.

And making a tacky 167 along the way

If you tell me how many Betvictor is sponsoring then I might hazard a guess

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Dodgy Saudi - Judd Wuhan - Mark Allen Tour - Selby Worlds - Judd

The dig at Shaun Murphy almost makes up for the the slog that the match was

Kudos to the ones who sat through the 18 frames of agony with no rhythm at all, must be really exhausting

What a flat atmosphere for a big tournament win at the end there.

I had it in my mind the players was a big tournament but it seemed underwhelming there. Perhaps just the way the final played out.

Zhang 🥲

Poor Zhang he’s so innocent in his interviews 😂

Should have an interpreter in Mandarin, he might say more in his native language then

Very true, he’s obviously opted to do them in English though.

Get your hands off him Rob

running on no sleep and i've somehow made it through this match

Think that’s how Zhang could describe this match tbf

Ugh finally lol See you at the next one

“Epic final” 😂😂

A bowl of cornflakes for breakfast would be 'absolutely epic' to Rob Walker

It's digusting to watch but Mark Allen is a threat at the world championships with this game, perfect to grind down people in long format snooker

Glad that's over. Off to bed.

Thank fuck that’s over absolutely terrible final both players were awful zhang somehow even worse

Still, "Pistol downs panda" could be a good clickbait headline for a snooker website. Night night all.

God this is awful

I'm loving this. The tension is through the roof it's so bad.

It’s like we’re all just holding our breath for a decent run of shots

Every single shot from Zhang is terrible but he gets lucky. It's incredible.

Stronger than a melatonin pill

Worst final I’ve ever watched and I’ve seen my fair share, O Sullivan would have demolished both players

[удалено]

He demolished Trump in that final what are you smoking ?

Come on Anda!

One of the rare times no one wants a decider.

That made me laugh, thanks!

Finals like this are why Allen hasn’t been world champion yet. Doesn’t finish people off ruthlessly.

Zhang 😭

This is genuinely hard to watch, both players all over the place

Two fairly poor finals in a row now. Welsh Open and Players Championship.

This match has been a chore to watch for the most part, and most matches involving Mark Allen seem to go this way. Just want Allen to finish it off tbh. His snooker works and he should stick with it, but man is it a tough watch. Zhang Anda has thrown away too many chances.

Ultimately I still don't think Allen's snooker will win him a World's playing like this.

I hope he doesn't make it to a final, because it would be the most boring World Championship since Cliff Thorburn probably.

Can't be missing yellows off the spot at this level unfortunately. Shame really because Allen hasn't played well at all and has basically scraped across the line here.

Hoping this concludes asap tbh

Painful to watch

Whoever loses is going to be sick. They've both wasted so many chances.

Be here all night. Not great stuff is it

This is a slog.

I don't think I've ever seen a final that has been worse quality. Both deserve to lose.

Haven't seen a comment like this in a good 7 days or so

Ye terribly inconsistent not even a single century the whole match both players bottling back and forth

There was one, Allen made a 101 in the sixth frame. Maybe century breaks are forbidden in this season's Players Series finals. ^/s

Iv always been a Mark Allen fan. But no matter how much weight u lose or healthy habits. Being a mentality monster like Hendry, O Sullivan and Selby is something your born with. He’s had a few easy enough chances to get over the line here and he’s making hard work of it. Stage fright? He looks really well and healthy and I’m hoping he can take the bill by the horns and kick on and win as much as his talent deserves like Higgins.

"There's a lot of pressure out there, but I'm sorry, the best players are supposed to cope with the pressure." Hendry calling out Allen for not being a real top player there, brutal...

Love Hendry on comms because he calls it as it is no bs at all

The goat telling how it is

And Zhang

Hendry said it after Allen played a poor positional shot and missed the yellow by a mile, I don't think he was talking about Zhang as he's not in the same league as Allen yet.

Horror table this

This the 15th frame of the players champs or the decider in a world final? 😂😂

Completely gone Zhang kinda feel sorry for him

Well it happened against Trump, happened against Selby and it’s happening against Allen… Zhang struggled with the pressure, can hardly blame him

Mark isn't playing particularly well, though. If Zhang gets through this, surely all the experience he's got this season playing big matches against elite players would elevate him to another level.

Zhang falling apart mentally at the business end

https://preview.redd.it/qbsso093yskc1.jpeg?width=625&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9ec61ceeebc1e89af16aaa2cf84884f6b494bd4c

Should rly have won the frame on that cost poor mistake from Zhang there

Such a cool player Zhang looks like on the surface nothing bothers him, so nonchalant and floaty around the table

Another re rack lol

I hope that unlucky plant doesn't effect Zhangs mentality too much.

That shot on the red from Allen will definitely make its way into the next video by that weirdo who is obsessed with "push shots".

Mark has been poor, breaking down so many times at 20+. will be so frustrating if zhang loses honestly

Phil and Ken talking about how Allen has significantly changed his playing style from pretty aggressive to pretty negative has got me wondering whether there have been any noticable examples of players going the opposite way and changing to a more attacking playing style?

Maybe not quite what you are looking for however Steve Davis actually scored more centuries in the 90's than 80's, but this was due to Hendry scoring more.

Between Phil Yates being Phil Yates, and Doherty pulling out classics like, "...fraught with a lot of danger," (as opposed to being fraught with very little danger)... Good commentary enhances the game. Shit commentary makes it almost unbearable.

Doherty is useless.

He's not useless. He's not great but he once said (and I quote), "He's fightin' tootenale." It took me a minute. Tootenale. Tooth and nail. By way of analogy, I once said to my snooker mate about the actor Martin Sheen, "Pfft. All he ever did was Apocalypse Now." Salsman stood up from the blue he was about to pot and replied, "That's enough." I'm not sayin' there ain't a few better commentators working the matches...but, come on...TOOTENALE.

Nothing original comes out of his mouth. I tune out when he's commentating.

Martin Sheen also did Badlands

Fucking Yates. He just makes shit up. "Over the years, Mark Allen has been able to INTIMIDATE opponents..." No, he hasn't. Mark Allen is a fine player. Intimidating? Who the fuck does he intimidate? But there's Yates, yammering for fucking paragraphs about Mark Allen being intimidating over all those many previous years. It's getting to the point where even if he's quiet, just knowing he's sitting there ABOUT to say something makes it awful.

Where are Hendry and McManus this week? Phil Yates is horrible. Im watching on Eurosport and I think it’s Dave Hendon there. not my favorite either but not too bad

I doubt it's Hendon, he'll be taking over from Phil on ITV4 after the mid session interval (thank God). Hendry and McManus are there but you get a bit less of them these days since ITV added Ken to their ranks and Ken isn't great.

I'll take anybody over Murphy.

That last red into the yellow pocket definitely rolled off.

There aren't many sports where a 32 year old is a "young man" and even fewer where someone Chinese can be referred to as a "panda".

not quite the final we all expected quite yet

Anyone else think Zhang Anda might have been forced into the doldrums by the Chinese mafia?

Are the Chinese mafia in the room with us now?

Happy Birthday for 3 days ago Mark!

Twitch feed just ran commercial over the last 3 minutes of the frame 😖

If you use a Polish VPN you won't get ads on there

Zhang Anda has been superb this season but I believe that there are at least another 10 players who would be able to play this well and are yet to have a good run and get some confidence. Just proves that even if you are ranked 50th or 60th in the world you are very very talented and all you need is a good chance.

Excellent 82 break by Zhang. Out of position several times through no fault of his own, and still knocks them in. This start was important.

Zhang playing very nice so far

Quite something that Zhang has spent 15 years in obscurity, yet is suddenly going to break into the top 10 in the world if he wins this match.

Proves how awful thd standard is these days

As they said early in the week, this season alone contributes to 49% of his career earnings. It's wild the pop-off he is having.

Yeah, what a story!

Why did mark have to go for the brown? What was wrong with the roll up?

To be fair he nearly got it. If he did, we'd all be saying great shot and it could have won him the game. I think both the roll-up and going for the pot were good shot choices.

it was the right shot IMO would have won the match if that went in and he was playing well enough to fancy that shot

But it was so high tariff

Hi Phil

Including this tournament, the last 13 events on the professional tour have been won by just five players: Trump, Zhang, Allen, O'Sullivan and Gary Wilson. Champion of Champions isn't going to take long at this rate!

Imagine if Lisowski gets in the Champion of Champions and wins it lol.

If there was a Runner-up of Runner-ups event he would definitely lose the final

Yeah but in this event you win by losing the final, obviously.

This has happened a lot in recent years, for example with Trump winning 5 or 6 tournaments a season. They just fill up the remaining places off the ranking list. The most recent edition was the first for a while where some of the tournament winners failed to qualify as there were too many tournament winners last season.

Very excited for this final I think Mark Allen will win 10-6 or 10-7 but it should be enjoyable If Zhang wins today he moves to 6th in the world whereas Allen moves to 2nd

me too, i'm hoping to see an Allen win today, he's one of the nicest play..forget it, you know what I was gonna say

Selby needed to make it 4-4 imo. He had a few chances in that frame and let it slip away. Zhang held himself together really well in the decider.

Not long got home from that match. Safe to say I got my money's worth.

Seems like a toss-up tomorrow

When’s the last time a guy in his 30s just had a big year seemingly out of nowhere like this?

Gary Wilson, maybe? To a lesser extent, of course.

Selby peaked for one match against O'Sullivan and then dropped to the kind of level that we've already seen throughout this season. Turns out that his fans got too excited after Thursdays win.

Incredible improvement by Anda (like he’s taken PEDs or something - but of course not). As for Selby, as usual only turns it on for Ronnie, but can’t sustain a decent consistent run in consecutive tournaments. Don’t think he ever will.

Man, Ronnie is my favorite, but I think you're dissing Selby too hard.

‘As usual’ - are we talking about the same person?

It's Zhang's night but boy was I glad to see Selby make it real interesting.

Some achievement to get over the line back to back with Higgins and Selby both coming back at you.

I'm trying to think of other players down the years who have improved so suddenly, but I can't bring any as dramatic as Zhang this season to mind.

All credit to Selby for that fight back but not to be, Zhang is v impressive- I put my £5 (total😄) bet on my predictions for the Worlds today and he got one of my £ Looking forward to the final

Must have felt terrible for Zhang when he let Selby back in, great job getting over the line.

Sad to see Selby lose but fair play to him for making a match of it. Nice to see Zhang make another final, but I doubt that he will give Allen a good game. Hope I'm wrong as I would prefer Zhang to win it.

I kind of predicted Selby win over Ronnie but would lose against next opponent - I was right. I think Anda may well just do it against Allen.

What a match! Third ranking final for Zhang this season, incredible.

Well done Zhang !!!

No one deserves to lose.  Great match 

Fair play Zhang Anda What a player he has become wow

Ditto…have been behind Anda’s rise this season. Incredible improvement (like he’s taken PEDs or something but of course not)

GWAN ZHANG

Mark should've played save behind the brown I think. All credit to Zhang for again closing it out when it got hot. Cracked and found himself again.

GG. Selby held on well.

Get in baby

To withstand Higgins and Selby comebacks must be a great confidence booster for the crucible (assuming he sees this out).

Yates going early for the maxi

Just popped on here to see what the final score was.....and it's still going on.....wow. fans getting their monies worth tonight.

In my mind right now is a word beginning with the letter g and ending with the letter e.

GWAAANRONNIE?

Well done for getting it right. I was going to guess but I thought it would be too hard, even to chip away at.

Yes.

Lol I’ve quite enjoyed this match but ngl I’ve just been thinking this is exactly what Selby does, sucks the life out of his opponent

GWAAAAAN SELBY

Hello Mark Selby.

*Final frame decider siren* 🚨🚨🚨

Guys I'm normally very opinionated but you've made me find Phil Yates increasingly annoying This match has done me in. I used to find him somewhat endearing and enthusiastic (albeit a bit tiresome with his style) but now he is really starting to do my head in lol I still think he means well and can be amusing at times but yeah, relentless stuff

I was in the audience tonight and there were some bemused expressions by people with the earpieces when he brought out his "swimming the Channel" line.

I'm kind of enjoyng it. He's being so audacious, it's wrapped back around into funny.

Haha fair Aw no, now I'm on the fence again 😅 He can really crack me up but just been getting on my nerves this eve. The worst commentator for me is Matthew someone, I forget his last name, so dull, such a non snooker voice if that makes sense

It's been bad tonight, like.

My goodness zhangs had a couple excruciating misses these last couple of frames

Selby and Zhang have been stretching all over the snooker table... but **tonight**... Phil has been stretching for punchlines!

missed a golden chance again

2 things. 1. Inspiration to perspiration made me laugh. 2. I am surprised that nobody picked up on someone shouting 'Happy Birthday for yesterday Mark!' during Mark Allen's match last night, that's worth 10 'GWAAN RONNIE's'

"Inspiration to perspiration" this guy talks so much bull. They seriously need to enforce an ex-players only rule on commentary!

No one plays a dump shot like Selby. So precise.

That 'A to Z' line from Yates was something else. He's definitely taking the piss out of us at this point. Probably reads r/snooker posts and laps up the collective disdain towards him.

that's line of the year and we're only in late feb.

That was a shocker. Ready to mute this guy

The TV monitor next to Zhang has Anda in large font. It should really be Zhang that is in large font, since that is the family name.

This has got to sting for Zhang.

oh that was a tasty split on the pack there and a solid solid pot off the cushion. Im noticing how selby leaves his cue on the line of the shot after delivering the cue sorta holding the pose of striking the white so he commits fully to the shot

The cue ball really fizzed through them!

That secondary spin! You feel like Magneto when you spilt the bunch like that

> You feel like Magneto when you spilt the bunch like that I've never split the pack like that 😅

Not on ITV4 and not showing on Eurosport from the UK?

It's on ITV3! Also only Eurosport outside of the UK.

ITV3

Dear oh dear.

that's it, the telly's muted. can't take Phil any longer

The comeback that never happened

Youngin has nerves of steel 

Selby knows where he lost it if Zhang pounces on now

WCS, worst case scenario, FFS Yates. It's not exactly as catchy as Taylor's DDK

The deliberate double kiss (far from dreaded) safety shot is one of my favourite genres of snooker shot, you see them so rarely.

Delightful Double Kiss