Recent UK Championship winner Zhao Xintong roared into a second final in two months at the German Masters in Berlin on Saturday. The 24-year-old from China, who made a huge career breakthrough in York in December, rattled off the last five frames to beat Ricky Walden 6-3 at the Tempodrom.
And in the first all-Chinese final in a major tournament for nine years and only the second ever, Zhao will face good friend and practice partner Yan Bingtao after the 21-year-old beat Mark Allen 6-4 in a tense evening semi-final.
In the first overseas tour event staged for two years since the pandemic broke out world No9 Zhao has again impressed in a high-class field.And he will play in the showpiece occasion on Sunday in front of 2,000 fans looking to pocket the £80,000 first prize and lift the Brandon Parker trophy.
After stealing a pivotal fifth frame that should have seen him fall 4-1 down, Zhao bossed the downcast Walden in all departments.Zhao, who has also beaten Judd Trump and Mark Williams this week, knocked in breaks of 78, 65, 72 and a superb closing 100.
He said: “It is very exciting, being into another big final only two months after what happened at the UK Championship. I would love to add another success.
“I actually didn’t play that well today, but Rocky gave me some big chances. The fifth frame was the big moment of the match. If he pots the green then I go 4-1 down and it is very difficult.Once I won that one to be just 3-2 down then I started to think that I had a good chance of winning the match.
“I think the experience from winning the UK Championship will help me in this final, and it has certainly given me more confidence when things are tough in matches.”
Had world No24 Walden, 39, potted an easy final frame-ball green and got to 3-2 down the outcome could have been very different – but from there his head dropped as Zhao powered on.
It was a real blow for Walden, attempting to reach his first ranking final since 2016 – since when he suffered for over a year with terrible back trouble that almost forced him to quit the sport.The Chester player has fought back bravely from that agony caused innocently by picking up his son five years ago to compete once more – but this was an opportunity that slipped away.
Three-time ranking event winner Walden, who has now lost both career meetings with the youngster, said: “If you pass up chances like I had in frame five at this level, it comes back to bite you.That miss on the green was a body-blow, I had made a good break to that point but seemed to switch off and my concentration left me.
“That’s what I have to re-learn playing in these big matches and semi-finals. With five shots taken again I win the match.By winning the UK Zhao is free-rolling at the moment, and you can afford to be a bit care-free and go for your shots rather than chasing it and rankings and money matter more. He has a big future.
“But overall things are going well for me, I didn’t expect too much here as I was ill with Covid a couple of weeks ago so to give it a good run shows some things are right.”
Former world champion Trump had been hoping to make it a German Masters hat-trick having won the event for the previous two seasons before running into Zhao in the quarter-finals - where he fell to an even more severe 5-1 drubbing.
World No2 Trump said after his loss: “The way Zhao is playing does remind me of myself when I was younger, coming through and had just got that first big title.He is definitely more confident than maybe he was a couple of years ago after winning that UK Championship in December – and that’s what you get from winning.
“The way he is playing and being so young, he is not frightened of going for everything – that is what his game is built on, and they are all going in.So he needs to just keep riding that wave, and stay as relaxed as he is. When you feel like that, nothing matters.”
Yan and Zhao are emulating Ding Junhui and Xiao Guodong at the Shanghai Masters in 2013, when Ding beat his compatriot. Marco Fu has lost a couple of finals to Ding, at the Masters and International Championship, but always stresses he represents Hong Kong rather than China - whatever the geopolitics of that situation.
Yan’s last two frames against Allen were incredibly tense. The Chinese player sportingly declared a foul on himself when set to clear up and win in an incident unspotted by referee Jan Verhaas or TV, and much later in the 10th frame Allen blew a chance to force a re-spotted black.
