Snooker Shoot Out: Anthony McGill wins in Watford


Anthony McGill held his nerve to come out on top to take the Coral Shoot Out crown after defeating Xiao Guodong in the final of the one-frame tournament.

A foul from McGill helped Guodong into a 19-0 lead early on, but the Scotsman fought back with a break of 67 to secure a 67-19 victory and his second title of the season.

It was the first time that the knockout competition has been recognised as a ranking event but it did not come without controversy at the Watford Colosseum.

Each match has a maximum time-limit of 10 minutes with a shot clock of 15 seconds for the first five minutes of the match before being reduced to 10 seconds for the second half of the frame.

But referee Rob Spencer failed to call a time foul on Xiao due to noise from the crowd as the Chinese player recovered from 14-0 down to beat David Gilbert in the quarter-final, much to the dismay of his world number 21 opponent.

Xiao started the day by scraping through his fourth round match with a 24-21 win over amateur Daniel Womersley while McGill was victorious over Northern Ireland Champion Mark King at the same stage.

World number 58 Guodong produced a break of 68 to defeat Ken Doherty and reach his dramatic quarter-final with Gilbert before dispatching former professional Andy Hicks with another impressive run of 59 in a 73-0 victory to reach his second Shoot Out final in three years.

McGill had whitewashed Jack Lisowski in a 78-0 rout to reach the last eight before edging past the in-form Anthony Hamilton 36-19 and then Shaun Murphy in the semi-final as he made it two victories from two in career ranking finals, having won the Indian Open last May.

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