In the first round of the World Snooker Tour Championship, which ended in the early morning of March 29, 2022, Beijing time, although China's famous Zhao Xintong successfully blasted a single score of 124, 108, 128, 53, 71 and 64 points, he still lost 9-10 to John Higgins, who scored 63, 57, 69, 56, 83 and 59 points, and did not qualify for the final four of this tournament. But this is only the first time in Zhao Xintong's career to participate in the Tour Championship, and it is commendable to be able to play a very good performance against such a powerful Higgins. Hopefully, he will continue to work hard in his future career.
Zhao Xintong opened fire to lead Higgins 5-3
In the first stage of the competition between the two sides, Zhao Xintong's state was very good. In the first set, Zhao Xintong took a 1-0 lead with a 76-0 clean sheet with a single shot of 53 points. In the second set, Higgins scored 63 points 71:1 to recover a 1-1 draw with Zhao Xintong. In the third set, Zhao Xintong won 68:57 and Hitkins, who scored 57 points, took a 2-1 lead. In the fourth set, Higgins scored 69 points and 70:23 to win the set to draw Zhao Xintong 2-2. In the fifth set, Zhao Xintong single-handedly blasted 124 points 125:0 to keep a clean sheet Higgins to take a 3-2 lead. In the sixth set, Zhao Xintong won another set 65:54 to lead Higgins 4-2. In the seventh set, Zhao Xintong single-handedly blasted out 108 points and won the set 108-19 to take a 5-2 lead. In the eighth set, Higgins won the set with a 64-26 performance to fall behind Zhao Xintong 3-5.
Higgins lost three straight sets to trail Zhao Xintong 4-8
After the game entered the second stage, Higgins still failed to play an excellent feel, and his performance also made Zhao Xintong play better and better. The game came to the ninth set, and Higgins won the first set 66:56 with his excellent ability to seize the opportunity and fell behind Zhao Xintong 4-5 to narrow the point difference to one set. In the tenth set, Zhao Xintong scored 44 points first and made a mistake, and then Higgins scored 36 points and hit the powder ball and made a mistake. Zhao Xintong scored the red ball in the left bottom pocket and finally won the game 92:36 to continue the lead over Higgins 6-4. In the eleventh set, Zhao Xintong single-handedly blasted 128 points directly to higgins and led the latter 7-4 to extend the point difference into three innings. In the twelfth set, Zhao Xintong once again played a brilliant performance, and he won the set 92:20 with a brilliant performance of 71 points in a single shot and led Higgins 8-4.
Higgins won five straight sets to beat Zhao Xintong 10-9
After the game entered the thirteenth set, neither of them was in very good shape, but Higgins, who was good at seizing opportunities, still managed to score 65 points with his excellent ability to grasp opportunities and finally won the game 65:8 to fall behind Zhao Xintong 5-8. The game came to the fourteenth set, Zhao Xintong took the lead in making a mistake and left Higgins with an offensive opportunity, Higgins spelled in the left bottom pocket red ball successfully won the mobile phone meeting, he unfortunately scored the black ball k after scoring 36 points and was sent a 7-pointer to lead Zhao Xintong 36:7. Although Zhao Xintong then tried to rewrite the score, Higgins, who was good at controlling the game, still won the game 84:7 and thus fell behind Zhao Xintong 6-8. In the fifteenth set, Higgins won the game 88-39 with multiple mobile phone games and a single-shot 56-point performance to fall behind Zhao Xintong 7-8. In the sixteenth set, Higgins scored 83 points to win the game 89-1 to draw 8-8 with Zhao Xintong. In the seventeenth set, Higgins scored 59 points to win the game 73:27 to lead Zhao Xintong 9-8 to get the match point. In the eighteenth set, Zhao Xintong won the round with 64 points and 80:20 to draw 9-9 with Higgins to usher in a double match point. In the nineteenth set, Higgins won the set 66:14 to kill Zhao Xintong 10-9 to reach the final four.