The draw for the Crucible stages of the 2022 World Championship was made this morning:
2022 Betfred World Championship – The Draw
The draw for the 2022 Betfred World Championship has been made, with defending champion Mark Selby opening his campaign against Jamie Jones.
Selby and Jones will take centre stage in the famous Crucible Theatre at 10am on Saturday morning, with their first round clash concluding later that day at 7pm.
Hossein Vafaei, who is set to become Iran’s first ever Crucible competitor, will make his debut in a mouth watering encounter with 2019 World Champion Judd Trump. The Ace in the Pack won his first ranking silverware of the season last month at the inaugural Turkish Masters, while Vafaei won his maiden ranking crown at the Shoot Out earlier this year.
World number one Ronnie O’Sullivan faces a tough test in the opening round against former Crucible semi-finalist David Gilbert. The Rocket is aiming for a record equalling seventh World Championship crown.
Kyren Wilson, who has reached at least the quarter-finals each year since 2016, has been pitted against Ding Junhui. They are both former finalists in the event, Wilson was runner-up in 2020 and Ding in 2016.
The top 16 seeds have been pitted against the 16 qualifiers who have battled through the qualifying stages at the English Institute of Sport over the last week.
Mark Selby v Jamie Jones
Yan Bingtao v Chris Wakelin
Barry Hawkins v Jackson Page
Mark Williams v Michael White————————————
Kyren Wilson v Ding Junhui
Stuart Bingham v Lyu Haotian
Anthony McGill v Liam Highfield
Judd Trump v Hossein Vafaei————————————
Neil Robertson v Ashley Hugill
Jack Lisowski v Matthew Stevens
Luca Brecel v Noppon Saengkham
John Higgins v Thepchaiya Un-Nooh————————————
Zhao Xintong v Jamie Clarke
Shaun Murphy v Stephen Maguire
Mark Allen v Scott Donaldson
Ronnie O’Sullivan v David GilbertThe final stages at the Crucible start on Saturday and run until May 2nd.
There we go … Ronnie probably has the worst first round draw he could get and Gilbert has probably got his worst nightmare. Shaun Murphyb and Stephen Maguire have history. Mark Williams and Michael White both probably curse their fate…
Ronnie O'Sullivan 
I think Gilbert isn’t such a bad draw for Ronnie. He plays reasonably quickly and doesn’t tend to get bogged down in safety battles, and he also doesn’t tend to be very mentally tough under pressure…
It is a tough draw, but at least it is a proper match, I feel a lot worse when Ronnie plays unknown entities, he may not know and for whom the only claim to fame is to beat Ronnie in an important match.
Although the bottom quarter looks tough on paper, Murphy, Maguire and Allen haven’t been at their best for some time. Zhao, Donaldson and Clarke are very inexperienced. It’s hard to predict how well Gilbert will play, but I agree he probably is the most difficult of the qualifiers.
I believe it’s the case that if Hugill won his first-round, that would cause Stuart Carrington to be relegated, with Gao Yang moving up to 4th place on the 1-year list and retaining his tour card. Similarly, if Jackson Page were also to reach the Q-final, Tian Pengfei could be trouble. What’s surprising is that the deadline for Q School entry has already passed. I assume there’s special dispensation for Carrington and Tian to get a late entry into Q School if needed. Tian and Gao will have to wait for another week before they know their situation, so going back to China is probably not an option just yet. Anyway, I don’t expect Hugill to beat Robertson, even at the Crucible Theatre which disadvantages Robertson.
As far as I understood, in previous years, players who weren’t sure of their situation had the option to enter the Q-school as a precautionay measure. I’m not sure if that meant they were refunded if they kept their tour card though.