Davis keen to make his mark

Mark Davis is hoping to produce his best performance yet at the Dafabet World Snooker Championship.
Mark Davis will begin his campaign at the Dafabet World Snooker Championship against Dominic Dale tonightMark Davis will begin his campaign at the Dafabet World Snooker Championship against Dominic Dale tonight
Mark Davis will begin his campaign at the Dafabet World Snooker Championship against Dominic Dale tonight

The St Leonards cueman is poised to make his ninth appearance on the sport’s biggest stage, but is yet to go past the second round at The Crucible Theatre in Sheffield.

Asked if his aim for this year’s event was to reach the quarter-finals for the first time, Davis said: “Yeah minimum. I would like to try and go as far as I can.

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I’ve had a couple of good results, but that’s the sport - that’s why the top players are the top players; they’re basically more consistent than everybody else.

“On their day anybody can beat anybody, but it’s doing it regularly and that’s what they do. I’ve not managed to get past the second round in that tournament yet, but hopefully this year.”

This year is the first time that Davis has been among the 16 seeded players and therefore hasn’t had to go through the nerve-racking qualifiers. But the world number 12 was handed a tricky first round tie against 24th-ranked Dominic Dale.

Although the tournament got underway on Saturday morning, Davis has had to wait until tonight (Wednesday) for the opening session of his best of 19 frames match. The second session will take place tomorrow afternoon.

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“I feel okay,” continued Davis, who planned to travel up to Yorkshire on Monday. “I went to see Terry Griffiths and we did a bit of work for a couple of days. There’s two or three little things I’m working on at the minute and they feel a lot better.

“I think I will probably get the major benefit next season once I’ve had a bit of time to work on them, but practice the last week or so has been pretty good. I’m starting to hit the ball quite nicely and hopefully just in time.”

If Davis wins his first round clash against Welsh qualifier Dale, he will face Crucible debutant Michael Wasley in round two. Wasley shocked world number two Ding Junhui 10-9 in a nailbiting match which finally finished at around midnight on Monday.

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