{"id":4315,"date":"2026-04-24T02:36:26","date_gmt":"2026-04-23T23:06:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vanak.news\/?p=4315"},"modified":"2026-04-24T02:36:26","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T23:06:26","slug":"robertson-wins-as-crucible-seeds-equal-record","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vanak.news\/?p=4315&lang=en","title":{"rendered":"Robertson Wins as Crucible Seeds Equal Record"},"content":{"rendered":"

Australian Neil Robertson<\/strong> defeated China’s Pang Junxu 10-6, ensuring a Crucible record-equalling 15 seeded players won their first-round matches at the 2026 World Championship. Fourth seed Robertson’s four-frame victory marked only the third time that all but one of the seeded players advanced past their qualifying opponents. The only qualifier still in the competition is world number 32 Hossein Vafaei of Iran<\/strong>, who defeated China’s Si Jiahui 10-3 earlier on Thursday.<\/p>\n

The Crucible has hosted snooker’s premier event since 1977, and while all 16 seeds have never advanced, 15 reached the second round in 1983 (when Jimmy White lost to Tony Meo) and again 10 years later (when Doug Mountjoy defeated Alain Robidoux).<\/p>\n

Robertson joked, “Hossein did me a favour earlier on because all the seeds had won, so the pressure was building and building, and who was going to be the one that let everyone down?” He expressed his inability to understand why the qualifiers had struggled so much, adding, “There were a few debutants this year and some young players that had not had the experience of playing here. The bigger surprise has been the lack of many close matches.” He concluded, “But there probably won’t be that fairytale underdog story this year.”<\/p>\n

Against Pang, Robertson maintained a 5-4 overnight lead and secured his victory with breaks of 77, 80, and a century break of 100 in the final frame. Robertson, who won the 2010 World Championship, failed to qualify in 2024 and was eliminated in the first round last year. He was then beaten 10-8 by Chris Wakelin, and the two players are set to meet again in the last 16, with their match commencing on Saturday and concluding on Monday.<\/p>\n

Two-time Masters champion Robertson believes the presence of most top-ranked players remaining in the tournament will be to his advantage. Robertson added, “It means there will be a lot of good matches. I have a great record at the Masters [which features only the top 16], so I enjoy playing the great players.” He explained, “I’m in the part of the draw where all the players are aggressive, so that will suit my game and means I don’t have to work too hard to play on my terms.”<\/p>\n

Vafaei: The Only Qualifier to Advance at Crucible 2026<\/h3>\n

Vafaei’s reward for defeating Si is a match against world number one Judd Trump<\/strong>. Si, a semi-finalist in 2023, initially held a 3-1 lead, but the 31-year-old Vafaei then won nine consecutive frames, aided by breaks of 81, 61, 60, 105, 53, 78, and 68. Across the final three frames of Wednesday’s first session and the four frames on Thursday, 15th seed Si managed only a combined 64 points, highlighting Vafaei’s impressive performance.<\/p>\n

Vafaei, who will play the 2019 winner next, commented, “Judd is one of my friends and a nice guy on and off the table. He is the world number one, so it’s the best match.” He added, “I’m getting a lot of support from back home, and they would love me to do very well in this tournament.” Vafaei concluded, “Si is one of the best players China has, so he was a tough opponent for me. I respect his game, and I’m one of his fans; he is such a great player.”<\/p>\n

Murphy Dominates Opening Last-16 Tie<\/h3>\n

In the first of the last-16 matches, 2005 winner Shaun Murphy<\/strong> established a dominant 6-2 lead over China’s Xiao Guodong. Murphy narrowly advanced 10-9 against Fan Zhengyi in the first round, describing his match-winning break of 50 in the deciding frame as the best he had ever made at the Crucible, especially after trailing 53-17. However, the 43-year-old Englishman found this session calmer, making breaks of 79, 103, 63, and 64 to take a 5-0 lead. World number nine Xiao claimed the next two frames, but Murphy finished the session strongly, taking the last with a run of 61 to establish a four-frame lead in the first-to-13 match.<\/p>\n

That match will resume on Friday at 10:00 BST, and Murphy could secure victory with a session to spare if he wins seven of the eight frames in that session. A third session, if required, would commence at 19:00.<\/p>\n

Northern Ireland’s Mark Allen<\/strong> holds a 5-3 lead against England’s Kyren Wilson, the 2024 champion. Two-time semi-finalist Allen made breaks of 50 and 78 to quickly establish a 5-0 lead, but Wilson fought back to win the last three frames of the session, aided by runs of 75 and 50. The second session is scheduled for Friday from 14:30, with the match concluding on Saturday morning.<\/p>\n

#WorldSnookerChampionship #Crucible2026 #NeilRobertson #HosseinVafaei #ShaunMurphy #MarkAllen #SnookerNews #SportsUpdate #JuddTrump #SnookerRecords<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Australian Neil Robertson defeated China’s Pang Junxu 10-6, ensuring a Crucible record-equalling 15 seeded players won their first-round matches at the 2026 World Championship. Fourth seed Robertson’s four-frame victory marked only the third time that all but one of the seeded players advanced past their qualifying opponents. The only qualifier still in the competition is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4316,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vanak.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vanak.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vanak.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vanak.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vanak.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4315"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vanak.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4315\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vanak.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vanak.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vanak.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vanak.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}