World Snooker Championship: Ronnie O’Sullivan level with Anthony McGill in Crucible second round

LONDON (BBC): World number 16 Anthony McGill reeled in defending champion Ronnie O’Sullivan to leave their second-round World Championship match finely poised at 4-4 after an enthralling first session.
Six-time winner O’Sullivan was at his majestic best as breaks of 81, 105 and 138 saw him race into a 3-1 lead.
O’Sullivan, 45, then went 4-1 up and missed a great chance to make it 5-1.
But Scotland’s McGill responded, holding his nerve an in increasingly tense game to win three frames in row.
The 30-year-old’s comeback should have been even sweeter. The two-time ranking event winner, a Crucible semi-finalist last year, was in prime position to make a 147 in frame seven, but left the black agonisingly sitting over the pocket on 97. It would have been just the 12th maximum in Crucible history and earned him £40,000, plus at least a share of the tournament high score prize of £15,000.
The best-of-25 frame match resumes on Friday morning and plays to a finish on Friday. Shaun Murphy fought back from 5-3 down to secure his place in the last 16 with a 10-7 win over over Mark Davis.
Davis, 48, was making his 12th appearance at snooker’s showpiece event and outplayed the out-of-sorts 2005 champion in the opening session. But Murphy, buoyed by a century in the final frame, reduced the gap to 5-4 and was much improved on the resumption. Breaks of 56 and 92 and helped him win four of the next five frames for an 8-6 lead and, after sharing the next two, the world seven number got over the line with stunning 131.
“There is massive difference between trailing 6-3 or 5-4. I got out of jail,” said Murphy, who faces China’s Yan Bingtao, the reigning Masters champion, in round two. “Mark always plays the right shot and he is so, so hard to beat. I knew I needed a fast start today. It’s a big victory and I’m thrilled with how I finished it “This evening, the first round concludes with three-time champion Mark Selby needing just two frames to progress after an 8-1 mauling of qualifier Kurt Maflin in their opening session, while the second round continues with a mouth-watering meeting between 2010 champion Neil Robertson and world number 14 Jack Lisowski.