Ding Junhui crushes Mark Williams to reach semis at snooker worlds

Ding Junhui defeats former twice titlist Mark Williams with a session to spare, by a 13-3 scoreline, to reach the semifinals of the snooker world championship, on April 26, 2016. [Photo/Xinhua]

SHEFFIELD, England - Ding Junhui defeated former twice titlist Mark Williams with a session to spare, by a 13-3 scoreline, to reach the semifinals of the snooker world championship on Tuesday.

Ding victory made him the first man into the last four at the Crucible and gave him a day off on Wednesday.

The Chinese super star, who lost 17-15 to Judd Trump in his last semifinal clash in 2011, took a 6-2 lead after the first session and extended his advantage to 10-2 in the night session with breaks of 109, 52, 95 and 73.

Williams, who changed his cue tip the night before the match, managed to make it 10-3 after the interval. Ding needed to win the last three frames to avoid a third session battle and he did make no mistakes to seal the victory 13-3.

Ding Junhui defeats former twice titlist Mark Williams with a session to spare, by a 13-3 scoreline, to reach the semifinals of the snooker world championship, on April 26, 2016. [Photo/Xinhua]

Ding will next take on the winner between four times champion John Higgins and Alan McManus over 33 frames on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Higgins led McManus 5-3 after the day's competition.

"I got some easy chances in that match," said Ding. "After 2-2 things just changed. I think I controlled the match, I took my chances to make breaks. I have confidence and every time I see a chance I think I can go for it and make breaks.

"Mark didn't play the way he normally does, everyone finds it hard to play with a new tip. The day off is a bonus, I've never had that before, and I'm going to enjoy the day.

Williams said: "I got beat easily and to be honest deep down I knew I was going to get beat easily, so I can't grumble.

"With the players left in, it was probably my best chance to win the world championship again and I felt really confident. But as soon as my tip split last night, I knew that my chances were gone.

"Ding will have to play much better than that to beat John Higgins, if he plays him next.

Elsewhere, Mark Selby took a 10-6 lead over Kyren Wilson and Marco Fu led Barry Hawkins 7-1.