Ronnie O'Sullivan successfully resisted Xi Jiahui's persistent attacking style to reach a thrilling semi-final against Zhao Xintong at the World Snooker Championship in Sheffield.
The seven-time champion twice watched his 22-year-old opponent go two frames behind but showed patience and his break of 76 for the black sealed his 14th Crucible semi-final appearance.
Xi, a surprise semi-finalist on his debut two years ago, showed no signs of repeating his previous form in the early stages and O'Sullivan barely had to break a sweat as he won the first frame of the second session to move 7-2 ahead.
O'Sullivan, playing in his first tournament since throwing his cue in the bin following his exit from the Championship League in January, produced a superb display with early wins over Ali Carter and Pang Junxu and Xi did not appear to be the opponent who would test his limits.
However, having started the final session four frames behind at 10-6, Xi's play became more confident and, with O'Sullivan's play becoming increasingly erratic with errors, the underdog won three of the four frames to go into the break just two frames behind at 11-9.
Xi had a great chance to reduce the deficit to 11-10 but he failed to hit the yellow and a classic 36-point break from O'Sullivan left him with no chance of winning the frame.
Continuing his confident play, Xi was the first to break in the 22nd frame to extend his lead to 43 points before a miss on the brown gave O'Sullivan an opportunity which he took to assert his advantage against rising star Zhao.
The 28-year-old capped a strong performance in the final by winning the only frame he needed to secure a comfortable 13-5 victory over Chris Wakelin.
Sourse: breakingnews.ie
