• World Championship

Ebdon crashes out to Dott

Peter Ebdon will drop out of the world's top 16 after his defeat to Graeme Dott © Getty Images

Enlarge

Related Links

• News: Davis leads Higgins after first session
  

Graeme Dott held off a late challenge from former world champion Peter Ebdon to move into round two of the Snooker World Championship with a 10-5 victory at the Crucible.

The 2002 champion trailed 7-2 after Tuesday's session, but came out all guns blazing to claim the opening two frames. Ebdon looked to be in control, pegging the Scot back to 8-5, but that proved to be Ebdon's final resistance and Dott wrapped up the victory.

The defeat will see Ebdon drop out of the world's top 16 for the first time since 1994.

World No. 3 Shaun Murphy has one foot in the second round after storming to an 8-1 lead against Northern Ireland's Gerard Greene.

After losing the opening frame, Murphy reeled off eight frames on the trot, including a century break of 108 in the fifth, to move within two frames of victory.

Neil Robertson won the third-longest frame in World Championship history to beat Ireland's Fergal O'Brien 10-5 and move into the second round.

Robertson took a 6-3 lead into the second session, but O'Brien started strongly, taking two games to move to within a frame of Robertson. Robertson denied his opponent the chance to draw level, snatching the next frame after O'Brien appeared to have it wrapped up.

It proved to be decisive, and in an epic 13th frame Robertson held his nerve to pot a black after O'Brien potted blue to black to force a respot with the scores level on 70-70. At 69 minutes it was the third longest frame in Crucible history, just six minutes short of Stephen Maguire and Mark King's 75-minute epic last year.

The Australian took the next two frames to wrap up the victory and set up a second-round meeting with Martin Gould, who stunned Marco Fu on Monday.

World No. 2 Stephen Maguire holds a three-frame advantage over Stephen Lee after their opening clash.

Maguire raced to a 3-0 lead, but a century break of 127 saw Lee close the gap to 3-2. But the Scot responded immediately with a break of 84 to restore his advantage. He leads 6-3 going into Thursday's session.

Ding Junhui was clinical in the way he finished off Stuart Pettman © Getty Images

Enlarge

Ding Junhui needed just over half an hour to take the two frames he needed to wrap up a 10-1 victory over Stuart Pettman and book his place in the second round.

The Chinese sensation was in stunning form on Tuesday, as he raced into an 8-1 lead, and it was always an uphill battle for Pettman.

Ding came out with all guns blazing and a break of 88 took him to within a frame of victory. The 11th frame was a scrappy affair and Ding appeared to hand Pettman a chance when he missed a blue into the centre.

But Pettman ran out of position from blue to pink and left the pink in the jaws - handing Ding the simple task of knocking in the penultimate colour to book his place in the last 16.

Ding will play the winner of the clash between Shaun Murphy and Gerard Greene.

Mark Davis came through a war of attrition to book his place in the second round with a 10-8 win over Ryan Day. Davis led 5-4 coming in to the second session, but Day edged ahead by taking the opening two frames.

The quality was not out of the top drawer, but Davis hit back to edge ahead at 7-6. Davis had a chance to go 8-6 ahead but ran out of position and Day overcame a 51-point deficit to level the contest once again.

The 15th proved to be a pivotal frame as both players missed chances. Day missed the black and Davis stepped in to edge ahead. It was all level again after 16 frames and it looked for all the world as though there would be a decider, but Davis had other ideas and pounced on a mistake from Day to edge 9-8 ahead and took a scrappy 18th frame to secure his place in the second round.

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.