Ronnie favourite for World Snooker Championship – Selby close behind
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We’re fast approaching the business end of the 2017 World Snooker Championship, with just eight players still standing in the tournament.
And despite heading to the Crucible as joint-favourite with Judd Trump to go all the way and win the trophy, world number one Mark Selby has been leapfrogged as the market leader by a man who knows all about how to handle being the frontrunner.
Step forward, Ronnie O’Sullivan, who is now 9/4 to win this year’s tournament.
The five-time world champ has breezed through his opening two matches with relative ease, seeing off Gary Wilson (10-7) and Shaun Murphy (13-7) respectively.
But he faces his toughest test yet in Ding Junhui in the quarter-finals.
Win that, and the Rocket will face either Marco Fu or Selby in the final.
The latter is just behind O’Sullivan in the outright betting at 11/4, although those odds could change drastically if he sees off Hong Kong Fuey in his third match at the Crucible.
John Higgins is next in the running at 4/1 to add to his four previous victories, while Barry Hawkins is 7/1 to go one better than he managed back in 2013 where he lost out to O’Sullivan in the final.
But a decent each-way shot could be Stephen Maguire.
He’s currently 18/1 to go all the way and lift the famous trophy (which would be his first win in a ranking tournament for four seasons).
He’s dropped just five frames en route to the quarters where he’ll meet Hawkins for a potential semi-final clash with either Kyren Wilson or John Higgins.
And he’s faced two difficult opponents in Anthony McGill and Rory McCleod – the latter defying the odds in the opening round to defeat Trump 10-8.
Maguire has rather unfortunately faced First Round exits in each of his last four Crucible appearances, so he’s already stopped the rot this time out.
The question is: just how far can he go?
Click here for a full list of 2017 World Snooker Championship odds.
All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publishing
