Snooker World Championship opens in style with Hendry 147

Stephen Hendry proved that he still has plenty of style on the opening day of this year’s snooker World Championship, racking up a 147 break as he sped to an 8-1 lead against Stuart Bingham.

The match ended 10-4 to Hendry, and he was not the only big name to make it through the opening round of this year’s snooker World Championship.

John Higgins prevailed in his match against Liang Wenbo – but with a Higgins v Hendry line-up in round two, one of the sport’s stars won’t be appearing in the quarter-finals.

Higgins is the defending champion, but was trailing 8-6 against Wenbo at one point, which might make Hendry seem worth a punt for sports betting fans who aren’t afraid to take a risk.

The weekend saw one other round-two line-up filled in on the fixture list, as both David Gilbert and Neil Robertson won their first-round matches.

Gilbert’s win was the tighter of the two, at 10-8 against Martin Gould, while Robertson relatively cruised past Ken Doherty 10-4, making the Aussie a likelier bet for round two.

But all eyes are likely to be on Higgins and Hendry for their first-ever Crucible meeting – and a punt on the winner of that match to take the World Championship title might not seem out of the question.