Peter Ebdon played a superb final frame to ensure he stayed on level terms with Paul Hunter in their Embassy World Championship quarter-final at Sheffield.
When he potted the final brown Hunter was set for a 5-3 overnight lead at the Crucible against the defending champion. But Ebdon achieved a snooker on the blue and then produced a blinding pot on the same ball followed by the pink to force a black-ball finish to the frame.
Again the determined holder conjured up another excellent pot to end the day deadlocked at 4-4.
Marco Fu whitewashed Stephen Lee 5-0 in their previous meeting but it was a different story on this occasion. Like Hunter, 25-year-old Fu, appearing in his first Crucible quarter-final, led 2-0 aided by breaks of 55 and 77.
World number seven Lee, beaten 13-10 by O'Sullivan at the same stage in 2002, clinched frame three on the pink. Fu, O'Sullivan's conqueror in the last 32, potted pink and black for 3-1.
However, when the game resumed Lee found the form that enabled him to beat Jimmy White in round two with six of the last seven frames. His run of 72 reduced his arrears to 3-2, levelled at 3-3 with a century and then dominated the seventh to go in front for the first time.
Fu, the first Asian professional to contest the Embassy last eight since James Wattana, replied with 114 to square the contest.
Filed By James McMahon
