John Higgins recovered from the disappointment of his Scottish Open semi-final defeat to Noppon Saengkham to book a trip to the German Masters with a battling 5-3 qualifying win over Daniel Wells in Sheffield.
The four-time world champion produced a trademark double on a red to set up the victory over Wells leading 20-0, before compiling a fine 44 in a tough matchplay encounter that saw Higgins top score with a relatively modest knock of 50 in the sixth frame.
He will make another trip to Berlin when the last-64 stage of the German Masters is held at the Tempodrom next month (29 January-4 February).
Higgins’ fellow former world champions Mark Williams and Ken Doherty are also through to the last 64 after enjoying wins on Monday.
Williams hit a closing break of 106 in a 5-3 success against David Grace, while 1997 world champion Ken Doherty progressed with a 5-0 whitewash of Jenson Jendrick.
European Masters champion Barry Hawkins was in heavy-scoring form as he ran out a 5-2 winner over Stuart Carrington, boosted by knocks of 103, 88, 69 and 138.
Elsewhere, Crucible semi-finalist Si Jiahui hit back from trailing Lyu Haotian 4-0 to complete a remarkable 5-4 win.
Lyu ran in 83, 64, 89 and 112 in dominating the opening four frames, but added only 58 more points as breaks of 123, 87, 98 and 103 saw Si progress to the final venue.
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‘30 years as a pro and that’s never happened’ – Higgins left scratching his head
German Masters qualifiers
- Thepchaiya Un-Nooh 5–1 Jamie Jones
- Ken Doherty 5–0 Jenson Kendrick
- Oliver Brown 5–0 Andres Petrov
- Si Jiahui 5–4 Lyu Haotian
- Mark Williams 5-3 David Grace
- Ricky Walden 5-1 Adam Duffy
- Rory Thor 3-5 Ben Mertens
- Dominic Dale 0-5 Liu Hongyu
- Elliot Slessor 5-2 Iulian Boiko
- John Higgins 5-3 Daniel Wells
- Jackson Page 3-5 Robbie Williams
- Barry Hawkins 5-2 Stuart Carrington
- Sam Craigie v Sean O’Sullivan
- He Guoqiang v John Astley
- Aaron Hill v Muhammad Asif
- Ding Junhui v Yuan Sijun
- Jack Lisowski v Zak Surety
- Andy Lee v Louis Heathcote
- Robert Milkins v Allan Taylor
- Ian Burns v Xiao Guodong
- Martin Gould v James Cahill
- Martin O’Donnell v Himanshu Jain
- Matthew Selt v Dylan Emery
- Kyren Wilson v Oliver Lines
- Andrew Higginson v Jiang Jun
- Zhang Anda v Mostafa Dorgham
- Jordan Brown v Long Zehuang
- Fan Zhengyi v Cao Yupeng
- Alfie Burden v Peng Yisong
- Stuart Bingham v Liam Pullen
- Andy Hicks v Joe O’Connor
- Hammad Miah v Jamie Clarke
- Pang Junxu v Jimmy White
- Haydon Pinhey v Rod Lawler
- Gary Wilson v Scott Donaldson
- Anton Kazakov v Matthew Stevens
- Alexander Ursenbacher v Ma Hailong
- Zhou Yuelong v Jak Jones
- Chris Wakelin v Mohamed Ibrahim
- Mark Joyce v Wu Yize
- Hossein Vafaei v Mink Nutcharut
- Stephen Maguire v Rebecca Kenna
- Liam Highfield v Jimmy Robertson
- Mark Davis v Ashley Hugill
- Graeme Dott v Victor Sarkis
- Ryan Day v Stan Moody
- Anthony Hamilton v Ben Woollaston
- Liam Graham v David Lilley
- David Gilbert v Dean Young
- Ahmed Aly Elsayed v Andrew Pagett
- Xing Zihao v Ross Muir
- Tom Ford v Baipat Siripaporn
- Noppon Saengkham v Ashley Carty
- Tian Pengfei v Reanne Evans
- Alfie Davies v Sydney Wilson
- Joe Perry v Ryan Thomerson
Held-over matches (January 29th in Berlin)
- Ali Carter v Michael White
- Shaun Murphy v Xu Si
- Mark Allen v Manasawin Phetmalaikul
- Judd Trump v Lukas Kleckers
- Ronnie O’Sullivan v Julien Leclercq
- Mark Selby v Marco Fu
- Neil Robertson v Sanderson Lam
- Luca Brecel v Ishpreet Singh Chadha
