Martin Gould’s UK Championship run ended on Friday afternoon with a 6-3 quarter-final defeat by an irresistible Ronnie O’Sullivan.
World number 18 Gould could not deal with a heady mix of O’Sullivan’s genius, some crippling bad fortune and his own poor shot selection early on.
O’Sullivan capitalised on those initial errors to hit brilliant tons in the first two frames, breaks of 107 and 106 taking him past Stephen Hendry as the tournament’s most prolific century-maker.
Gould was more competitive in the fourth frame, engaging in a lengthy tactical exchange which saw brilliant safeties, snookers and escapes from both players, before O’Sullivan emerged on top to go in at the interval 4-0 up.
The five-time UK and World champion was cueing well enough but also got the run of the balls, inadvertently nestling on the blue after a mishit safety which gave him the initiative in frame five – but he still required an excellent pot into the middle to wrest control.
Gould responded, though, in brilliant fashion with a composed break of 101 – his third century of the tournament – to end the threat of a whitewash and then won the next two frames, scoring a 61 and then a 70.
A superb long red in frame 10, though, was not enough – Gould missed a pink into the middle and O’Sullivan cleared up with a 94 to finish it off.
This post was last modified on 08/12/2017