Snooker’s German Masters Is Back in Germany but Where Is Trump?
31 snooker players are set to descent on Berlin’s Tempodrom this week to contest the 2022 BetVictor German Masters. 128 players were originally in contention, but three-quarters of the field have been eliminated during two rounds of qualifying matches staged at the Chase Leisure Centre in Cannock, England, three months ago.
Judd Trump and Shaun Murphy are amongst the contenders for this week’s BetVictor German Masters. Neither have been playing at their best this season. ©GettyImages
Given that timescale, the form worth of those qualifying matches is negligible. It is noteworthy Zhao Xintong registered four century-breaks – two of which were total clearances – during those qualifying rounds. Just a few weeks later, he won the UK Championship at treble-digit odds. Snooker, like so many sports, is all about current form.
Alas, last weekend’s one-frame Snooker Shootout – won by Hossein Vafaei – is also worth very little from a form perspective. The format cannot be compared to the German Masters, a competition that employs a ‘best of nine frames’ structure at the outset and features a ‘best of 17 frames’ decider.
Trump Has Form in the Book
Judd Trump won this tournament 12 months ago when Covid-19 forced it to stay in the UK. It was played in Milton Keynes behind closed doors. But Trump has happy memories of Berlin’s Tempodrom having also won the German Masters in 2020.
In fact, the 2019 World Champion has a remarkable recent record in the German Masters. He was a quarterfinalist in 2019 and a semi-finalist in 2018.
Trump is yet to win a ranking tournament this season. That has to be a major concern to both his supporters and favorite bakers. Like every raking event Trump has contested during the 2021/22 campaign, the current world-ranked number two heads into this weekend’s competition as outright favorite. BetVictor, the competition sponsor’s, have him priced at 5/2.
Helping his cause is the withdrawal of his first-round opponent, Gao Yang. It means Trump will need to win just four matches to take his third consecutive German Masters.
Robertson’s in Form
But Neil Robertson is the form horse. The Australian was a convincing winner of the Masters beating Jack Lisowski, Ronnie O’Sullivan and Mark Williams ahead of his 10-4 demolition of Barry Hawkins in the £250,000 decider.
The winner of the English Open in November and a finalist in December’s World Grand Prix, the proclaimed ‘Thunder from Downunder’ is 5/1 in the outright betting and 3/1 to reach the final.
It is noticeable old foes Ronnie O’Sullivan, John Higgins, Ding Junhui, Masters finalist Barry Hawkins, Stuart Bingham and last year’s beaten finalist, Jack Lisowski, have all failed to make the German stages of the 2022 German Masters.
Selby’s Struggles
On paper, that means Mark Selby – once again world ranked number one – should have a big say in proceedings. However, in the immediate aftermath of his exit from the Masters, the four-time World Champion took to Twitter to open up about the mental health issues that he had been “bottling up for years”.
Beyond his personal turmoil – and probably attributed to it – Selby’s recent results, which are primarily a string of second and third-round competition exits, make him hard to fancy in this tournament.
2005 World Champion Shaun Murphy is another player who is struggling for form. The ‘Magician’ has gone almost two years since winning a tournament and he has departed at the first or second round stages of the bulk of competitions he has played this season.
Williams Has the Credentials
If Judd Trump does not return to winning ways and Neil Robertson stumbles, the most viable candidate for the £80,000 winner’s prize is Mark Williams. The Welshman won this season’s Welsh Open and failed to make the final of the recent Masters by just two points – Neil Robertson landed the deciding frame in their semi-final match by 69-points-to-67.
Williams is a two-time German Masters champion and a serial tournament winner. Amongst a field lacking in strength and depth, at BetVictor’s tasty 20/1 he could prove the best bet in this ninth ranking tournament of the year.
