Peter Ebdon versus Stuart Bingham – 2011 Betfred.com World Snooker Championship Preview
Peter Ebdon and Stuart Bingham will face each other in the first round of the 2011 Betfred.com World Snooker Championship, which is going to be staged from 16 April to 3 May at the Crucible Theatre, Sheffield, England.
This clash is one of the toughest in the last-32, as both players have met nine times before in professional competitions. The mighty Ebdon leads Bingham by 5-4 in the nine matches that they have played. Their match-ups have been tight and close.
Their first meeting was in 2003, at the UK Championship in York and then in the 2006 Masters. The third time both players met each other, was at the 2006 UK Championship. All these three meeting went in the favour of the world number twelve, Ebdon.
However, Stuart had an upper hand in their other three ranking events meetings which took place in the 2006 Malta Cup, the 2008 Shanghai Masters and the 2004 Daily Records Players Championship. He registered himself in the first two events before losing
out by a frame 5-3 in third one.
Later on both Englishmen were twice one-on-one in the Championship League and they shared one win each. Their final meeting went Stuart’s way and it was in the 2009 6-Red World Grand Prix. Though Peter leads in the bigger matches, Stuart has won three of
their last four encounters.
As far as their Crucible history is concerned, the 40-year-old Ebdon leads his opponent by a huge margin. He has played nineteen times before at the home of snooker and this would be his successive 20th appearance. He has also lifted the World
Championship trophy once in 2002 after beating Stephen Hendry by a frame score of 18-17. Moreover, he has also been a runner-up in the 1996 World Championship and 2006 World Championship respectively.
Meanwhile the thirty-four-year-old Binginator has participated only four times before, in 2000, 2002, 2008 and 2009 and this is going to be his fifth debut at the Crucible Theatre. His credentials are also very low as compared to Ebdon, as he has not been
able to make it to the quarter-finals as of yet.
As far as this year’s season is concerned Ebdon has had a solid season. Though he started this season being ranked within the top 16 for the first time, he regained his place by winning matches at each of the tournaments. Apart from his UK Championship defeat
to Andrew Higginson, he qualified for the Shanghai Masters and the World Open. He also was consistent in the PTC event and on the top of all he recently defeated both Gerard Greene and world champion, Neil Robertson, to reach the quarter-finals of the Bank
of Beijing China Open, where he lost to Judd Trump.
Bingham on the same note has also had a very good season this year. He has been consistent throughout in the PTC event, due to which he earned himself a place in the PTC Grand Finals. However his best performance sparked in UK Championship where he outplayed
the likes of Ronnie O’Sullivan and Marco Fu to reach the quarter-finals, where he lost to Mark Allen.
Keeping all the above mentioned facts in front, it is fair to say that this is one of the most even matches. Though it will be Ebdon who will start off as a favourite because of his huge experience of playing at the Crucible Theatre, it can be turn out to
be a fully stretched battle.
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