Ronnie O’Sullivan stunned by phenomenal performance from Gary Wilson in third round of Scottish Open

Gary Wilson produced a phenomenal performance to knock Ronnie O’Sullivan out of the Scottish Open with a 4-3 victory in the third round.

Wilson made very few errors and some big breaks to be on the front foot for most of the high-quality match.

It’s the earliest O’Sullivan has been eliminated from the Scottish Open since the event’s revival in 2016.

“I just tried to stay as calm as I could, in the moment,” Wilson said in the Eurosport studio. “I felt like I didn’t have much to lose because I’ve been in that situation quite a bit.

“With Ronnie you can break off and lose the frame. I was expecting the worst but not in a bad way.

“I thought if he pots all the balls and wins the frame it’s nothing new, if he misses, happy days and I’ll see what I can do when I get my chance. That’s all you can ask for.”

Both players were in fine form straightaway with Wilson punching in a long red to make a brilliant frame-winning break of 72, before O’Sullivan hit back with an equally impressive 69 to make it one apiece.

The back and forth continued as Wilson produced a superb 83, which included a brave plant where the two reds were a reasonable distance apart.

It looked like Wilson would be away again when he potted an acute red underneath the pack into the right middle, but he missed his next red.

Despite fluking a green, O’Sullivan could only make 40 but Wilson missed a black, leaving the seven-time world champion to pick up the pieces to make the match all-square again.

O’Sullivan then missed an awkward cutback on a red at the bottom of the bunch which Wilson punished with a fine 82 to go 3-2 ahead.

Under pressure to win the last two frames, O’Sullivan potted a long red at the start of the sixth frame.

He was on course for a 147 early on but fouled on the fifth black when a red went into the pocket at the same time as he went into the pack.

It felt like that might have been O’Sullivan’s last shot, but Wilson missed a red with the rest to the bottom left pocket.

A couple of scoring visits later and O’Sullivan made it 3-3 by clearing the table to send the match to a decider.

Wilson had the first chance but ran out of position immediately when potting a red.

An intriguing safety battle played out and came to an end when a red rolled over the bottom left pocket.

O’Sullivan tried to plant another red onto it but missed, so Wilson had another opportunity, although the table was not easy with all the colours off their own spots.

As he had been throughout the match, Wilson was on fire and knocked in a tremendous break of 73 to beat O’Sullivan for the first time.

He will play Yan Bingtao or Hossein Vafaei in the last 16 on Thursday.

Elsewhere, Mark Selby booked a place in the last 16 with a comfortable 4-1 win over Robert Milkins and Zhou Yuelong whitewashed Barry Hawkins.

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