SNOOKER

Mark Williams will spend the weekend battling for a place in the semi-final of the UK Snooker Championship after proving he is still king in Wales.

The three-time world champion from Cwm recovered from 2-0 down against fellow Welshman Jamie Clarke to win 6-4 and set up a meeting with Ding Junhui.

Clarke, who came from 5-1 down in the first round to beat Kyren Wilson, made a break of 128 in the second frame as he raced into a 2-0 lead.

But Williams hit back, bookending a run of five straight frames with a 138 and a 107 to move to within sight of victory at 5-2.

Clarke had his fair share of chances but wasn’t clinical enough in the early part of the match.

He pulled two frames back to close the gap, but it only delayed the inevitable, as Williams ran out a 6-4 winner, clinching it in style with a century.

TABLE TENNIS

Anna Hursey will spend this weekend playing league table tennis in Germany but has set her sights on a place in the Great Britain team for the Paris Olympics after breaking into the world’s top 100 women players.

The latest World Table Tennis (WTT) rankings show Hursey placed at No.93, making the 17-year-old from Cardiff Britain’s highest-ranked player.

That status in itself will not be enough to guarantee Hursey Olympic selection, but if she makes it into the world’s top 80 by June of next year, she is likely to earn a place in the opening round draw in Paris.

“The last few tournaments I’ve played in, I’ve felt as though I’ve been making big improvements and that has got me into the top 100,” said Hursey, a bronze medalist for Wales, along with Charlotte Carey, in the women’s doubles at last year’s Commonwealth Games in Birmingham.

Now, my coaches are looking at the possibility of me, maybe, qualifying for the Olympics.

“It’s hard to get there and you have to be a little bit higher than I am at the moment, but it’s definitely possible.

“There will be around 80 places available through the world rankings, which gives me quite a few more tournaments to play in before June.