Australia’s 2010 World Champion Neil Robertson admitted he is highly motivated to add the Machineseeker German Masters title to his CV after scoring a superb 5-2 win over world number one Judd Trump at the Tempodrom in Berlin.
The Thunder from Down Under has 24 ranking titles to his name and has won just about every accolade in the game, but is yet to triumph in Berlin. He is now just three wins away from a maiden crown as he prepares to face Yuan Sijun in the last eight on Friday. Yuan came through a thriller with Johnstone’s Paint Masters champion Shaun Murphy 5-4.
Trump arrived in Berlin as defending champion, after beating Si Jiahui in last year’s final. He’s a three-time winner of the event, but will have to wait at least another 12 months to add a fourth.
This evening’s encounter got off to a cagey start, with Robertson taking a tight opener. He then missed a black off the spot to go two ahead. Trump forced a re-spot, but a fine safety from Robertson extracted an error and allowed him to eventually secure that 2-0 lead.
Trump then claimed two on the bounce to restore parity at 2-2. Robertson won the fifth and then fired home breaks of 86 and 131 to burst over the line in free flowing fashion.
Robertson said: “Every player coming here wants to get down to the single table and I’m just one win away. This is pretty much the only tournament I haven’t won. Motivation is extra high, if it wasn’t already.
“I got to the final a few years ago here against Judd and it was an amazing occasion. The crowd love it. They get more enthusiastic the closer it gets to the final. They applaud even straightforward shots and it is a privilege to play here. I always get tremendous support in Germany.“
World Champion Kyren Wilson came through a repeat of last year’s Crucible final against Jak Jones with another victory, this time prevailing 5-3 after a hard fought battle.
The pair crossed cues in snooker’s biggest match last year, when both players were seeking to become World Champion for the first time. After 32 fiercely contested frames, it was Wilson who triumphed 18-14.
Wilson has kicked on to have a fine campaign as Crucible king so far, picking up silverware at the Xi’an Grand Prix and the BetVictor Northern Ireland Open, as well as making the final of the recent Johnstone’s Paint Masters.
Jones has also enjoyed a strong campaign, having fired in 53 centuries with only Trump able to top that number. However, after falling short in Sheffield against Wilson he’s still searching for a maiden career ranking crown.
This afternoon’s encounter saw Jones lead 3-2, before Wilson crafted runs of 103 and 60 on his way to three frames on the bounce and a 5-3 win. He now faces Anthony McGill in a repeat of their epic 2020 Crucible semi-final, which he won 17-16. McGill came through with an impressive 5-2 win over former International Champion Zhang Anda.
Irish 22-year-old Aaron Hill is through to his second ranking event quarter-final after holding off a Tom Ford fightback to win 5-3.
Hill reached his maiden quarter-final at last season’s Wuhan Open, where he fell just short against Wu Yize 5-4. He will be hoping to take at least one step further this time and make the semis. The Cork cueman now faces Xiao Guodong, who was a 5-1 winner against Elliot Slessor.
“It’s another game. I’ll try to have the same preparation I’ve had all week, but it will be a tough match. That is what you expect when you are playing in this end of the tournament. I’m delighted to be here now, but hopefully I’m not finished yet,” said Hill.
“The crowd has been amazing all week. I’d like to thank them actually as they’ve been a great support to me. I beat Mark Williams in the first round and I think they like an underdog. Hopefully they can stay on my side.”
China’s Wu is also through to the last eight after a 5-2 win over Swiss number one Alexander Ursenbacher. He faces Barry Hawkins, who received a bye after Ricky Walden had to pull out on medical grounds.
There is also the interview with Aaron Hill at the end of this report, but because they opted for sharing it with their new platform “Play” it’s geo-blocked in many countries, in all countries that are supposed to have a broadcaster for the event.
Here is a screenshot of what I get at the bottom of the quoted piece:
How stupid is this? It doesn’t make sense really. This is a report. Are you also supposed not to read it because you had no “legit” opportunity to watch the action either? And I highlighted “supposed” because they were lazy and didn’t do their research properly or simply don’t care about some countries. I live in Greece. Contrary to what WST seems to believe, we don’t have access to Eurosport, we don’t have access to Discovery+ and we don’t have access to HBmax in Greece. There were “plans” to make Discovery+ and HBmax available in Greece but they were not (yet?) implemented. For months now I can only watch snooker if it’s on YouTube, Facebook or by using a vpn, which of course comes at a cost , on top of the cost of HBmax that I only managed to buy by pretending to be in the Netherlands (using the said vpn). IF really WST wants to be WORLD snooker they have to stop senselessly restricting access to the sport because it doesn’t help its growth. But does UK-centric WST really care about growing the game in mainland Europe. I’m doubtful, really!
But back to the snooker …
I watched two of the matches.
Neil Robertson played well. He’s not at his very best yet, but he’s getting there. Judd Trump on the other hand is no more at the stratospheric level he showed early in the season. That’s only normal. He’s human. Nobody can sustain top form all the time. Fatigue and dips in form are inevitable.
The Yuan Sijun v Shaun Murphy match deserved better than a single line in the WST report. It was a compelling match and many German fans stayed to watch despite the late finish1. Yuan showed considerable tactical skills as well as potting ability. He also proved to be very solid under pressure.
2025 WSF Championship
The event can be followed on snookerscores with two tables shown on YouTube, without geo-restrictions.
That event is at the QF stage and this is this morning program
There were 172 players in the field at the start of the event, 41 of them from England. Only two of them remain and they are older players. Not one of the English young players made it to the final day.
The youngest player still standing is Chinese Gao Yang (20). Brian Cini (24) is from Malta, Umut Dikme (28) from Germany, Mateuz Barnowski (27) from Poland, Florian Nuessle (23) is Austian, Fergal Quinn (24) is from Northern Ireland. In contrast both Englismen still standing play on the seniors tour. Stuart Watson is 48 and Barry Pinches is 54. This is not a dig at Stuart and Barry, they are there on merit but they are not the future of the sport.
Clearly, the future of snooker is not English, should not be English, and the strongly England-centric nature of WST isn’t helping its development, quite the opposite. You will tell me that maybe English youngster concentrate more on the Q-Tour, but many of them were in Morocco this week, and, anyway, the Q-Tour is dominated by Zhao Xintong this season.
Maybe WST press officer didn’t? It would explain the one sentence “reporting” on that match ↩︎
4 thoughts on “The 2025 German Masters – Day 4 and WSF News”
Hi Monique, it looks as though they are even shafting the UK viewers now! Discovery+ sent out an email on Wednesday. Eurosport and TNT sports brands will be brought together, with all sport content available in one destination via TNT sports. All the standard plans are going and everyone is being reverted to the basic plan which is £3.99 a month but will not include the snooker. Monthly fee was £6.99 a month/£84 for the year. To upgrade to the premium plan costs £30.99 a month/£384 for the year! Over 4x as much! TNT is really expensive because of the football and Champions League/Europa League exclusivity which you might not even want! Absolutely ridiculous.
I have had a Eurosport/Discovery+ subscription for over 5 years. Users on snooker.org are saying it is only applying to England/NI Discovery+ subscriptions, so if you live in Europe and a territory that has access to Discovery+, you are fine. Personally I think this is a terrible decision from Discovery+ to bundle all the sport together as a lot of people who want to watch snooker, skiing, cycling etc. and who don’t necessarily want the football are now going to be paying a ridiculous amount for the privilege. I hope loads of people cancel their subscriptions. Absolute greed! It could have a detrimental effect on UK viewing figures for snooker. Eurosport coverage for the snooker has always been great! In the UK they exclusively show 13 of the 21 tournaments on the calendar this season. They also broadcast all of the qualifiers for people who want to watch that. I can’t see the logic in this other than pure greed!
Yes, it’s almost certainly greed. I live in Greece where we have nothing, even if we are willing to pay. And I can’t even use WST “play” platform because WST seems to believe that all Europe has access to Discovery+ . So, I pay for a vpn and then pay for a subscription to HBmax in a country that has it and where I can “appear” to be in with the vpn … All this mic-mac is not going to help growing snooker popularity…
I have now returned from Berlin, and watched yesterday’s evening session at home, on Discovery+. As always, it’s been a great event, lifted by the enthusiastic crowd and the spectacular venue. Particularly notable was the support for ‘international’ players. On the first night, there was a Polish flag draped across a couple of seats (Antoni Kowalski was playing). You wouldn’t see that in a UK event. Players like Ursenbacher, Brecel and Zizins also got distinctive support. But the Germans do know their snooker, and were as always delighted to see the top players in live action. The only negative is that possibly the playing conditions could be improved. It’s a very unusual layout, and some players definitely struggled to adjust. But all venues are different, and it is the job of a professional player to prepare for it and adapt.
Both the German Masters and the WSF championship are building to a climax, with some extremely attractive matches today, involving players who have potential.
Thank you for this feedback Lewis. Yes, some players struggle to adapt. There is a lot going on, applauses may come at “unexpected” moments because fans near “your table” may actually be watching another table. “uneven” lighting of tables on the side of the arena have been an issue as well. On a couple of occasions when I was there the weather outside was extremely cold, with thick snow. The combination of (necessary) heating and humidity caused issues and “static” shocks. BUT all in all it’s a very special venue and the fans are usually extremely nice to all players and passionate.
Ronnie O'Sullivan 
Hi Monique, it looks as though they are even shafting the UK viewers now! Discovery+ sent out an email on Wednesday. Eurosport and TNT sports brands will be brought together, with all sport content available in one destination via TNT sports. All the standard plans are going and everyone is being reverted to the basic plan which is £3.99 a month but will not include the snooker. Monthly fee was £6.99 a month/£84 for the year. To upgrade to the premium plan costs £30.99 a month/£384 for the year! Over 4x as much! TNT is really expensive because of the football and Champions League/Europa League exclusivity which you might not even want! Absolutely ridiculous.
I have had a Eurosport/Discovery+ subscription for over 5 years. Users on snooker.org are saying it is only applying to England/NI Discovery+ subscriptions, so if you live in Europe and a territory that has access to Discovery+, you are fine. Personally I think this is a terrible decision from Discovery+ to bundle all the sport together as a lot of people who want to watch snooker, skiing, cycling etc. and who don’t necessarily want the football are now going to be paying a ridiculous amount for the privilege. I hope loads of people cancel their subscriptions. Absolute greed! It could have a detrimental effect on UK viewing figures for snooker. Eurosport coverage for the snooker has always been great! In the UK they exclusively show 13 of the 21 tournaments on the calendar this season. They also broadcast all of the qualifiers for people who want to watch that. I can’t see the logic in this other than pure greed!
Yes, it’s almost certainly greed. I live in Greece where we have nothing, even if we are willing to pay. And I can’t even use WST “play” platform because WST seems to believe that all Europe has access to Discovery+ . So, I pay for a vpn and then pay for a subscription to HBmax in a country that has it and where I can “appear” to be in with the vpn … All this mic-mac is not going to help growing snooker popularity…
I have now returned from Berlin, and watched yesterday’s evening session at home, on Discovery+. As always, it’s been a great event, lifted by the enthusiastic crowd and the spectacular venue. Particularly notable was the support for ‘international’ players. On the first night, there was a Polish flag draped across a couple of seats (Antoni Kowalski was playing). You wouldn’t see that in a UK event. Players like Ursenbacher, Brecel and Zizins also got distinctive support. But the Germans do know their snooker, and were as always delighted to see the top players in live action. The only negative is that possibly the playing conditions could be improved. It’s a very unusual layout, and some players definitely struggled to adjust. But all venues are different, and it is the job of a professional player to prepare for it and adapt.
Both the German Masters and the WSF championship are building to a climax, with some extremely attractive matches today, involving players who have potential.
Thank you for this feedback Lewis. Yes, some players struggle to adapt. There is a lot going on, applauses may come at “unexpected” moments because fans near “your table” may actually be watching another table. “uneven” lighting of tables on the side of the arena have been an issue as well. On a couple of occasions when I was there the weather outside was extremely cold, with thick snow. The combination of (necessary) heating and humidity caused issues and “static” shocks. BUT all in all it’s a very special venue and the fans are usually extremely nice to all players and passionate.