Judd Trump and Joe Perry won their respective group yesterday and here is the report shared by WST:
Strong Finish Sends Trump Through
Judd Trump battled back from two frames down in Table One’s final match of the day, with a 2-2 draw against Xu Si being enough to reach Winners’ Week at the BetVictor Championship League Snooker – Ranking Edition at the Morningside Arena, Leicester …
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Masters champion Trump opened with 3-0 wins over Reanne Evans and Jimmy White, but still needed to avoid defeat in his last match against China’s Si. And when Trump lost the first two frames, his place in Winners’ Week was in doubt. But in the third he made his 904th career century, then Trump battled his way through the fourth frame to secure a 2-2 draw and top the group.
In the Group 18 decider, Joe Perry’s break of 128 – the highest of the day – helped the Gentleman over the line against Jamie Clarke. Perry had earlier beaten Andy Lee 3-0 and drawn 2-2 with Stuart Carrington, while Clarke had opened with two wins. But Perry rounded off the day with a 3-0 success and he’ll be back in Leicester next week.
Shaun Murphy returns to Championship League Snooker on Wednesday, 12 July, taking on Tian Pengfei, Andrew Pagett and Lukas Kleckers in Group 4 …
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Group 12 sees Barry Hawkins, Zhang Anda, Sanderson Lam and Jamie O’Neill look to secure a place in Winners’ Week.
Neither Judd Trump, nor Xu Si were at their best but both played well enough considering this is the first event of the season.
Jimmy was extremely poor, maybe because he was unable to focus properly on the task at hand. From what transpired on social media, he was due to play exhibitions in Asia in a few days time , but the schedule was changed and, as a result, his first exhibition is to be played today. That’s far from ideal and surely that meant that he had to change his plans and rush all sorts of things… It’s a shame really.
I didn’t watch Reanne, not because I didn’t want to but because I too had to deal with last minutes changes of plan. That Reanne beat Jimmy, the way Jimmy played yesterday, isn’t particularly surprising but I wasn’t expecting her to be able to avoid defeat against Xu Si. She got a draw in that match.
Reanne got death threats on twitter. I’m not entirely sure why. When this happens it’s usually coming from people who lost a bet or lunatics. Women in snooker get more than their share.
I saw very little of the other group, but from what I saw, Perry was his usual reliable/experienced self.
Of course this event “counts” towards the 2023 Champion of Champion
WST have published what they called the “schedule”
There are currently 14 players meeting qualification criteria, two more spots to be allocated and 7 more events counting towards the selection. I suppose that the different “groups” above are indicative of the relative “priority/importance ” of the various events. At least this year the “World Championship Runner-up”, Mark Selby, has already secured his spot by actually winning an event. That weird inclusion in the “Champion of Champions” was created to get Ding in it. This time, as it stands, Ding is in it by right, but by no means guaranteed given that the event he won is in the lowest priority category.
Ronnie O'Sullivan 
I fin it weird that this Championship League would have more priority than the Home Nations. And why does the English Open from last year count? Did it now count for last year’s CoC? And then this year’s will count too?
The English Open moved from December (22) to October (23). The former was after, the latter before the year’s CoC. Therefore, there are two instances of the English Open between last year’s CoC and this year’s. It doesn’t matter, though, since Selby, winner of the English Open in 2022, is already qualified, having won the WST Classic. There will not be two players present at this year’s CoC qualified by winning either instance of the English Open.
The bigger oddity is the sorting of the tournaments within groups according to the dates (scurrilously enough, except for the last group). That sorting directly influences the chances of the champions (#17+) to participate at the CoC. It’s weird, and perfectly unjustifiable.
Finally, I don’t think “invitational” tournaments should make it into the list. The “haves” – already privileged by being invited, and the big payday that usually comes with it – get another shot at qualifying for the CoC – the icing on the cake.
Thank you for clearing up the English open issue for me. Which tournament is invitational here besides Shanghai? If they are adequately weighed, I don’t mind them: better than being invited based on ranking.
Strangely, the match reports and summaries by commentators don’t mention what actually happened in Group 2 – probably it didn’t fit their narrative. Xu Si should have beaten Trump in the last frame, but missed an easy red in the middle pocket. It’s quite an important moment in his career: can he beat a top player? He’s known for a great work-ethic and has incorporated numerous technical methods (e.g. SightRight). But he usually fails to put those matches away.
Conversely, Joe Perry did manage to get through in the last match. I guess it’s all about experience.
Thank you for that Lewis. I didn’t see it TBH. My daughter and my grandson are due to arrive in Santorini in a few hours and … I have been quite busy. But it is interesting because, from what you report, Xu is at that stage where one big win could possibly unlock a far bigger potential than what he showed so far.