Dott survives late scare to reach semi-finals
Scotland's Graeme Dott held off a late surge from Australia's Neil Robertson to book his place in the semi-finals of the Snooker World Championship with a dramatic 13-12 win at The Crucible.
Dott came through in the best of the 25 frames quarter-final despite a wobble in the final session.
Resuming 10-6 ahead, Dott looked to be coasting to victory as he established a 12-8 lead before Robertson came back to win four frames in a row - including breaks of 74 and 103 - to force a winner-takes-all 25th frame.
Robertson started the session with a 53 break to take the opener, and followed it up with a 106 in the 18th frame.
But the 17th and 19th frames went to Dott to give him a comfortable 12-8 lead at the interval.
Robertson made a 74 break to cut the gap to three frames.
Dott should have sealed the match in the next frame, but missed a straightforward red.
The Australian made a 103 in the 23rd frame, after Dott had been forced to play into the reds when the referee replaced the white in the wrong place, and then took the next to force a deciding frame.
Both players had their chances in the decider but Dott held firm for victory.
"I thought the whole match had gone perfectly for me. I played well in the first session and the second half of the second but then Neil played fantastically well today," said Dott.
Robertson claimed the result had not been a fair reflection of the match.
"I'm very disappointed to lose. I thought I was by far the better player. He nicked six or seven frames at least," said the 24-year-old from Melbourne.
"At 8-4 down someone told me my body language wasn't very good and that I was huffing and puffing around the table. I fell into Graeme's way of playing by concentrating on safety.
"Today I played the way I wanted to play and completely outplayed him. I knew I could get on a roll and steamroller him. It's a shame I only realised that towards the end instead of early on."
AFP
