Brecel surges into early lead in snooker world final
Luca Brecel belied his new reputation as the comeback king of the Crucible Theatre by making the early running on Sunday in his snooker World Championship final against four-time winner Mark Selby. Brecel took a 6-2 lead after the opening session of the best-of-35-frames contest. The Belgian won seven straight frames to beat seven-time world champion Ronnie O'Sullivan in the quarter-finals. The 28-year-old then reeled off 11 in a row from 14-5 down against China's Si Jiahui before winning 17-15 in the last four. Prior to this year's edition, Brecel had never won a match at the World Championship. But he continued his fine form on Sunday as he won the first three frames while making breaks of 77 and 90. Selby, however, looked out of touch following his semi-final win over Mark Allen in the early hours of Sunday morning, with the Englishman missing several chances as well as making uncharacteristic safety errors. He missed two blacks off their spots and it needed a rare Brecel missed pot to let Selby in to win the fourth frame. Brecel, however, extended his lead with a well-made break of 67 and then came out on top in a lengthy safety exchange before winning the sixth frame after cutting in a tight blue. Selby won his second frame of the match with a break of 62 but that was only a brief respite as the aggressive Brecel took the next to be four ahead leading into Sunday's evening session. (AFP)