Seven-time world champion Ronnie O’Sullivan suffered a shock 5-1 loss to Lyu Haotian in the quarter-finals of the Wuhan Open.
Breaks of 76 and 66 helped China’s Lyu into a commanding 4-0 lead, and while O’Sullivan responded with a run of 101, he was unable to mount a fightback.
World number 41 Lyu will now meet Ali Carter in the semi-finals.
The Englishman made five half centuries on his way to a comfortable 5-2 victory over Northern Ireland’s Mark Allen.
Breaks of 78 and 63 gave Carter a 2-0 lead with Allen then grinding out the next two frames to draw level with a half century of his own.
But Carter reeled off the next three with runs of 77, 52 and 57 to confirm his passage into the last four.
Allen’s defeat also means he misses out on the opportunity to overhaul O’Sullivan at the top of the world rankings.
The 37-year-old, who is currently ranked third after a superb 2022-23 campaign in which he won the UK Championship and was named as Player of the Year, needed to win the event to become the world number one for the first time in his career.
Earlier on Friday Judd Trump continued his impressive form with a 5-0 win over Tom Ford. The world number four and English Open winner, made breaks of 67 and 118 as he swept past Ford into his 56th career ranking semi-final.
Trump will now face Chinese teenager Wu Yize, who edged out Ireland’s Aaron Hill 5-4 in a final-frame decider.
Disciplinary action against the ‘Macau five’ averted
Meanwhile, the World Snooker Tour says it has given a group of players dubbed the ‘Macau five’ “permission to enter” a rescheduled exhibition event in the special administrative region of China.
Current world champion Luca Brecel , four-time world champions John Higgins and Mark Selby, plus Carter and Thepchaiya Un-Nooh had been set to face disciplinary proceedings over their preference to travel to the Far East instead of entering the Northern Ireland Open in Belfast.
All five will still skip the Waterfront Hall event, but with promoters pushing the show back in Macau from October to the 22-24 December, the WST said a “a mutually agreeable solution has been reached to avoid further action”.
Speaking on the onefourseven snooker podcast, former world champion Shaun Murphy, added: “The Macau five were from my point of view, clearly in breach of their player contracts, which is a sad state of affairs.
“I do believe that snooker players as self-employed tradespeople should be allowed to play in whatever tournament we like, whenever we like, but that isn’t the case when you sign up to play on the WST.
“From a players point of view I can understand why you would go. There is no stress, it is not a tournament really, it is an exhibition, you get looked after like a rock star with the red carpet laid out everywhere.
“All your expenses are paid, your personal assistant’s expenses are paid and you are given appearance money which is more than the runners-up cheque at the Northern Irish Open. The WST need to ask themselves why someone would prefer to go to Macau rather than one of their prestigious events.”
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