WILLIAMS IS GROUP 5 CHAMP

The Final

Ricky Walden 1 – 3 Mark Williams MBE

25-72 (Williams 48), 0-136 (Williams 136), 47-39, 26-72 (Williams 63)

Semi Finals

Judd Trump 2 – 3 Ricky Walden

117-0 (Trump 110), 58-74 (Trump 36, Walden 68), 67-13 (Trump 51), 1-131 (Walden 104), 0-131 (Walden 131)

Ben Woollaston 1 – 3 Mark Williams MBE

82-4 (Woollaston 84), 4-78 (Williams 78), 21-75 (Williams 55), 35-70 (Williams 38)

Mark Williams continued his solid run of form as he eased his way into the Championship League Snooker’s Winners’ Group with a 3-1 victory over Ricky Walden in the final of Group Five at the Ricoh Arena, Coventry.

The Welshman has enjoyed four wins in the group stages before beating Ben Woollaston in the semi-final. Walden, who looked dead and buried after the first set of matches yesterday, fought back today with wins over Judd Trump and David Gilbert to finish in fourth place and make the play-offs.

Williams looked the dominant player in the final, winning the first two frames, the second with a sizzling break of 136. Walden took won back, taking blue and pink to clinch a tight frame, before a run of 63 in the fourth effectively sealed the match for Williams.

“I played alright. The long day was yesterday for me where I played four matches. Overall, I played well; I had some good breaks and was pleased with the way it went.

“I’ve put in a lot of hard work and the results have been showing. I can give Stephen Feeney a lot of credit with SightRight which has really helped my game. I’m enjoying and looking forward to March.”

Williams will now join Ali Carter, Zhou Yuelong, Mark Selby, and Kyren Wilson in the Winners’ Group, which takes place at Ricoh Arena on March 28th and 29th.

Having finished fifth on the round robin group table, Martin Gould will return to compete in Group Six along with Ricky Walden, Ben Woollaston and Judd Trump. They will be joined by Li Hang, Michael White and Graeme Dott.

Championship League Snooker is a venture between Matchroom Sport and Perform where 25 of the game’s elite players compete with matches broadcast on a host of betting websites.

Each group features seven players with each man playing the other six once in a round-robin basis. Every match is the best of five and the winner gains one point with the loser getting zero.

At the end of the league phase the top four advances to that group’s semi-finals before the two winners meet in the final and the group champion advances to the Winners’ Group in March.

The losing finalist, two losing semi-finalists and player finishing fifth move into the next group where they are joined by three new players and the process is repeated.

Group Six commences at 11.00am on Thursday (January 25). Live scoring can be found at www.worldsnooker.com. Group fixtures and results can be found at https://championshipleaguesnooker.co.uk/