• Snooker World Championship

Legend Davis beats King

Ronnie O'Sullivan had to rely on his first-session advantage © Getty Images

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Steve Davis dug deep into the memory banks to claim a thrilling 10-9 win over Mark King in the first round of the World Championship.

Davis' star is certainly on the wane, but he can still produce the goods on occasions and battled back to secure his first Crucible win in four years.

The former world champion trailed 5-4 heading into the evening session and a couple of solid contributions put King further ahead. A break of 54 helped Davis cut the deficit and the veteran levelled proceedings at 6-6 after King missed a decent chance.

Davis' play was far from spectacular but the wily campaigner took advantage of King's shortcomings to edge ahead 7-6 at the mid-session interval.

The play ebbed and flowed and it seemed inevitable that the match would head into a deciding frame. That proved to be the case and both players had chances to secure the win. After a prolonged safety battle, it was Davis who took his chance and frame ball, a long red into the corner, was greeted with a huge roar from the crowd. It also brought a fist pump and yell of elation from the normally stoic Davis.

King played on and had a chance to lay a snooker that he needed, but pushed the cue ball too far Davis picked off the green. The safety battle continued but King's hopes ended when he inadvertently potted the pink to hand Davis a place in the last 16 where he will face John Higgins.

"In terms of performances and considering I haven't had much match play that was like climbing a mountain for me," Davis said. "Other than that I probably only produced one other decent performance this season and that was against Stephen Hendry in the UK when I got back to 6-6 before he played very well to win.

"I'd love to play him, he's a great, great player. I don't look at the draw but to play John Higgins as World Champion will just be fantastic. It will be tough against him, he's a hard player."

Davis has admitted he had trouble focusing during the match. "I was 5-3 down and all of a sudden I started looking, I only had it two other times in my life, it's called ocular migraine," he said. "Where you get all sparkly lights and you can't see. Looking at the balls in the last frame and they all started going blurry.

"I managed to make a forty odd break but I could only see half the ball. It was the weirdest thing, I had it since about four o'clock, maybe it was the stress or the pressure I don't know. I had some bananas in the interval tonight and that worked."

The battle of the former champions looks to be going the way of Graeme Dott who produced some excellent play to secure a 7-2 lead over Peter Ebdon.

Earlier in the day, Ronnie O'Sullivan survived a scare to defeat Liang Wenbo 10-7 in the first round.

He was made to work hard for the victory by Liang, who threatened to wreck O'Sullivan's bid for a fourth Crucible title by winning five of eight frames in the second session.

In the end O'Sullivan was grateful for the commanding 7-2 lead that he held when play resumed on Tuesday.

Despite having accrued a five-frame advantage, O'Sullivan had been visibly unhappy with aspects of his play during the first day of the match. One show of frustration led him to raise his middle finger after a ball failed to nestle in the pocket - a display of dissent that earned him a warning from the match referee.

At the start of the second session it seemed that O'Sullivan's disgruntlement would continue, as Liang threatened to come back into the match. The Chinese player took the first frame after the resumption, before opening up the table in the second to give himself the opportunity of a clearance.

He was unable to put the balls away, however, and the world No. 1 made him pay by edging the frame 61-60. O'Sullivan was now just two frames away from a second round tie against China Open winner Mark Williams, who defeated Marcus Campbell in the first round.

O'Sullivan got within one of victory by opening up a 9-3 lead, before Liang stirred to claim the final frame before the mid-session interval. When play restarted, Liang would go on to win the 14th - securing a century break - and the 15th, reducing the deficit to three frames at 9-6.

The gap between the players was down to two when Wenbo claimed the next frame. Although O'Sullivan appeared unflustered in his chair, he cannot have failed to recognise the threat from Liang - who had the confident air of a man who believed he could be set to cause one of the tournament's greatest upsets.

It was not to be, however, as O'Sullivan held his nerve to see out the victory with a crucial run of 73.

Ding Junhui is on the verge of a place in the second round of the Snooker World Championship after racing into an 8-1 first-session lead against Stuart Pettman.

World No. 13 Ding has four ranking victories to his name - including at the 2009 UK Championship - and on the evidence of this showing he looks a good bet for a fifth.

He held a 4-0 lead at the first interval after capitalising on a series of mistakes from Pettman. Having barely troubled the scorers in the first two frames, Pettman looked set to take the third - but an injudicious shot choice handed the initiative to Ding, who made no mistake with a break of 53.

Pettman was again his own worst enemy in the fourth, as a poor positional shot cost him a promising angle on 51. Ding came to the table and rattled off a run of 77 that gave him an ominous-looking four-frame advantage before the players took a break.

Ding Junhui pounced on Stuart Pettman's errors © Getty Images

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Ding continued to dominate after the resumption, winning frames five and six with clearances of 88 and 129 to guarantee a lead to take into the second session. Just as it seemed that Ding was looking unstoppable, Pettman finally managed to hit back by reducing the deficit to 6-1.

The comeback was fleeting, however, as Ding resumed his dominance to claim the eighth and ninth frames, the latter secured with a break of 95. The match will resume on Wednesday morning.

Mark Davis launched a comeback from two frames in arrears to end the first session 5-4 up against Ryan Day. At the beginning of his campaign for a first ranking title, Day was quick out of the blocks as he raced into a 2-0 lead that featured a second-frame break of 97.

Davis was not about to be overwhelmed, however, and showed his battling qualities to comfortably seize the third 84-18. He used the initiative garnered from notching up his first frame to score 85 on his only visit to the table in the fourth, leaving the scores level.

As the players picked up their cues following the interval, it became clear that the momentum was now firmly behind Davis. A break of 52 edged him over the line in a tight fifth frame, before he took a 4-2 lead following a back-and-forth tussle in the sixth.

Day was not to be denied, however, as he showed the resolute side to his game to take the seventh 54-11. The final two frames of the first session were traded between the players, and they will resume battle on Wednesday morning.

World No. 9 Neil Robertson raced into a 5-1 lead against Fergal O'Brien with runs of 70 and 64, before the Irishman fought back to win the seventh and eighth frames. Australia's Robertson gave himself breathing space going into the final session - which begins on Wednesday afternoon - by clinching the final frame with a century break to take forward a 6-3 lead.

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