World GP: Murphy well-priced to avenge World C’ship Bingham loss
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The 2016 Ladbrokes World Grand Prix final will see a repeat of last year’s World Championship final in Llandudno.
Stuart Bingham and Shaun Murphy will renew the rivalry that began at the Crucible last year, when Bingham took his sport’s biggest prize at the expense of Murphy with an 18-15 win.
If that victory was a surprise for the 39-year-old, who was a pre-tournament 50/1 outsider to win the World Championship, it would arguably be a bigger achievement to defeat Murphy here, having fallen short of his best since claiming snooker’s top honour.
In fact, neither player has reached the final of a ranking tournament since their Crucible battle until now, although it has been Murphy that has made more serene progress in Wales.
While Bingham was scrapping with all his might to come from behind to beat Joe Perry in the semi-final, Murphy has coasted through to the final and made light work of Ding Junhui in his own semi.
Following that, tournament sponsors Ladbrokes made the 14th seed the 8/15 favourite to avenge his victory of almost 12 months ago.
Bingham can be backed at 6/4 and is an even-money chance to prevail with a 1.5-frame headstart in the handicap market.
Murphy is favoured in just about every market offered by Ladbrokes, including the betting to have the highest match break. It’s 4/6 about the World Championship runner up recording the biggest break, with Bingham 11/10. Only Murphy has a century break to his name of the pair in this tournament.
In the correct-score scene, Murphy’s most likely victory looks to be by a four, three or two-frame margin. The price for a 10-6, 10-7 and 10-8 Murphy win is identical at 15/2, while the shortest offering in Bingham’s favour is the 9/1 about a slim 10-9 triumph.
The final kicks off at 13:00 on Sunday, live on ITV4.
All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publishing.
