Neil Robertson has crashed out this year's Betway UK Championship in York. The 34-year-old was sent packing from the first round by Peter Lines 6 - 3 after a poor performance from the Thunder from Down Under. Lines was 3 - 1 up at the mid-session break and was clearly playing the better Snooker.
Robertson, who last year made a maximum in the final (see video) beating China's number two Liang Wenbo, has let Ronnie O'Sullivan in with a chance of potentially winning a sixth UK Crown as the Rocket was playing some sublime snooker in his first round match with Thailand's Boonyarit Keattikun.
Televised stages begin over weekend
O'Sullivan made three centuries in six frames, including a 129. Mark Williams and John Higgins, the Class of 92, are still left in the event. World number one Mark Selby also eased through the last 128 as the televised stages of the event begin over the weekend from Saturday.
Peter Lines and his son Oliver Lines are both through to the last 64, with Oliver Lines playing European Master Judd Trump next.
Although Mark King has the highest break so far of the event, a 141, the Essex cueman who won his first ranking title last weekend in Belfast at the age of 42 was knocked out of the event also having been docked a frame for forgetting his cue.
Chinese teenagers Yan Bingtao and Zhou Yuelong survived their first round matches with Bingtao scraping through in his match 6 - 5.
Robertson has had a fairly quiet season despite winning the very first ranking event of the 2016/17 season when he won the Riga Masters at the beginning of the summer.
Champion of Champions Update
Last season at this time he had already won the Champion of Champions in Coventry meaning he had already qualified for the 2016 edition, and then double qualified for it by winning the 2015 UK Championship.
Mark King and John Higgins are so far the first two players to have qualified for the 2017 Champion of Champions, and in York this week, fans will find out who will be closer to going to the Masters in January as the top 16 players.
Before Christmas, there is one more ranking event proper the Scottish Open, the third leg of the Home Nations series, where one player will lift the Stephen Hendry trophy.
