Dungannon's Patrick Wallace secured a dream World Championships quarter-final against his lifelong friend Joe Swail with a 13-5 victory over Mark King at the Crucible this evening. The world number 59 took victory thanks to seven successive frame wins, with the highlight a splendid clearance of 125.
The 31-year-old, who had to come through three qualifying rounds just to take his place at the Crucible, insisted: "I'm totally surprised to win so comfortably. I watched the tournament on television last year and in the quarter-finals Joe played Dominic Dale, who had beaten me in the qualifiers. I was sat there thinking 'it could have been me'. There was no way in the world I could have believed that a year on it would actually come true."
Meanwhile, Peter Ebdon completed the quarter-final line-up as he finally prevailed in a battle of attrition against Stephen Lee. The 12th seed, winner of two ranking tournaments this season, had trailed 9-7 after a lengthy second session, but fought back to lead 12-11 today when the match had to be carried over because the deadline had elapsed.
There had been little to separate the duo so it was no surprise when Lee took the match to a decider in which Ebdon drew first blood with a break of 38. The Wellingborough-based star always held the edge in the frame, leaping up and punching the air when he rolled in a long black to put it beyond the reach of fifth seed Lee. Ebdon, whose victory secured a meeting with Ronnie O'Sullivan, enthused: "I'm pleased I dug deep and did what was required. I didn't mean the outburst at the end because I didn't want to show disrespect to Stephen but I just exploded. It's just that the victory meant so much to me after I had got very bogged down in the second session when I was simply beating myself." (PA)
Filed by Shane Murray
