Ireland's Ken Doherty is through to the quarter-finals of the Embassy World Snooker Championship at the Crucible after a thrilling 13-12 win over England's Mark King. It was a tense and dramatic encounter and one which Doherty will feel lucky to have come through.
The 1997 champion had made a marvellous recovery from 6-2 behind in Friday's play to go ahead 11-7. But King refused to buckle and rattled off four frames without reply to level the match at 11-11. Doherty edged to within one of the finishing line before King ensured the match would go down to the very last frame. The Irishman remained the more composed and King eventually conceded after Doherty had left him needing snookers. The world number four will now face either Stephen Hendry or Anthony Davies in the quarter-finals. Hendry has taken a 6-2 lead overnight after the opening session.
"It was a really, really tough match. He played some really tough match snooker out there. I haven't seen him play for over a season and he surprised me a lot with how good his safety was. In the last session he came back at me again and it was getting really tense. The last frames were very tense," said a relieved Doherty afterwards.
Elswhere, Peter Ebdon has joined Doherty in the quarter-finals after completing a 13-7 victory over Joe Perry this evening. Anthony Hamilton leads Mark Williams 5-3 after their opening session earlier today.
Filed by Tom Grealis
