Wuhan Open 2023: Ronnie O’Sullivan edges out Pang Junxu, Judd Trump sweeps aside Matthew Selt in third round

Ronnie O’Sullivan edged out Pang Junxu in a gripping nine-frame third-round thriller at the Wuhan Open.

O’Sullivan drew first blood in the match with a break of 67 up to the yellow, after going unpunished by Pang following two poor safety shots.

The Rocket doubled his lead in emphatic fashion thanks to a clearance of 128 and would make Pang rue missing a red to the bottom left.

He duly dispatched the reds with relative ease, and the crowd lapped up the latest century break from the world No. 1.

Pang halved the deficit though and eliminated any fears of a whitewash, by capitalising on a rare error by The Rocket. After successfully potting the yellow, green, brown and blue, he failed to land the pink into the yellow pocket.

The Chinese player duly delivered and finished off the frame with a clinical black into the middle-right pocket.

O’Sullivan squandered a golden opportunity to extend his lead with a pack of reds ideally positioned, but his frustration was clear to see after being thwarted by the green.

After an extensive safety battle, and the tightest one in the match up to this point, Pang landed the final red and effectively progressed his way through the colours.

He potted the pink needed to draw level heading into the interval, and was now firmly back in the contest after previously facing a daunting 2-0 deficit.

What followed would have been scarcely believable as Pang utilised the red-black combination to brilliant effect, and wrapped up the frame with a red to the bottom-right pocket to turn the match on its head.

O’Sullivan desperately needed to respond, and he did just that with a vital clearance of 93 to level the overall score at 3-3.

However, he could not build on that, and a break of 107 with the pink and black both left on the table left him on the brink of causing a huge upset.

This pulsating contest would go into a decisive ninth frame, after O’Sullivan turned on the style with a fantastic break of 117 that ended on the brown.

Pang went for the spectacular in a safety battle, with the remaining reds on the table. It backfired horribly and opened them all up for O’Sullivan to clear with aplomb and find his way up to the pink.

After a huge scare, The Rocket can now look forward to a clash against Sijun Yuan in the last 16.

Judd Trump had no such problems against Matthew Selt after a brilliant 5-0 whitewash victory.

It was his second win of the day after previously overcoming Oliver Lines 5-2 in the second round, and he duly marched into the fourth round.

He got off the mark with a break of 59, before falling just short of a century clearance to double his advantage.

Selt made a better fist of things in frame three after putting 32 points on the board, on the only occasion where Trump failed to get a break higher than 50.

Normal service was resumed, though, with Trump taking a dominant fourth frame, before completing a commanding result in frame five with a break of 52.

He can now look forward to a tantalising fourth-round match-up against Barry Hawkins on Thursday.