Hendry finds going tough as he sees off old foe Davis

Published on Sunday 6 December 2009 23:27

STEPHEN Hendry won an absorbing battle with fellow snooker great Steve Davis to reach round two of the Pukka Pies UK Championship – but admitted he was finding the game "torture".

The 40-year-old Scot finished with a century – his third of the match – as he clinched a 9-6 victory over the 52-year-old Essex cueman. When Davis came through qualifying to set up the clash with Hendry, it was perhaps the most eagerly anticipated of the first-round matches. Yet Davis could not score heavily enough and that was his downfall, even though he kept pace with Hendry for much of the contest.

It was anyone's match at 6-6, but runs of 37, 40, 41 and 112 from Hendry ensured he will go on to tackle Mark Selby in the next round. Hendry had made centuries in the first and final frames of the early-afternoon session, 115 to start with and then a 130 clearance to black, and during those big breaks he looked like the fearsome player of old.

However, like Davis, he missed far more balls than he would have done in his heyday, which should give Selby some encouragement.

Hendry said: "I won, it's as simple as that. Snooker is torture at the moment. It's very frustrating.

"In the last frame I potted a long red and made a good break – that's what you're supposed to do, do it in one visit. It was a great atmosphere, it shows we are still popular, which is nice."

For a while it seemed that Jamie Cope would be waiting for the winner of Hendry's match, but Selby staged a brilliant fightback. The 26-year-old Leicester potter was 8-4 down and staring at defeat to fellow Englishman Cope, but he reeled off five successive frames to take the match, with breaks of 67, 101, 57, 115 and a closing 73.

Peter Ebdon reeled off five frames in a row himself to sink Judd Trump 9-4, in another all-English battle, making breaks of 80 and 84 along the way.

Welshman Ryan Day went out of the tournament after a heavy 9-3 defeat to China's Liang Wenbo, while Australian Neil Robertson converted a 5-3 overnight lead into a 9-3 victory against England's Tom Ford.

Grand Prix champion Robertson made breaks of 48, 64, 53 and 87 before finishing with a break of 119, and he will face John Higgins or Ricky Walden next.

Stuart Bingham will face Glaswegian Stephen Maguire in round two after knocking out Joe Perry in an all-English battle. Bingham carried a 6-2 lead into yesterday's session, and completed a 9-4 victory without needing to find any 50-plus breaks.