The 2016 Masters takes place between the 10th and 17th January at Alexandra Palace in London. The first really big snooker event of the year and part of the “triple crown”, the Masters is always a thrilling event, packed with snooker of the highest calibre. We take a look at the latest edition of this magnificent event and give you the best live odds, as well as our tips and predictions for the outright winner betting.
Let’s take a look at those odds first of all. Ronnie O’Sullivan heads the betting at odds of 4/1 with Sportingbet, whilst Neil Robertson is not too far behind at 5/1 with Coral. Next up in the outright winner market is Judd Trump, priced at 6/1 with Unibet, whilst Mark Selby is priced at odds of 8/1 with Coral. Defending champion Shaun Murphy is priced at 9/1 with Sportingbet and is sure to fancy his chances. The rest of the field are out at double-digit odds but the likes of John Higgins (12/1 with Bet365), Ding Junhui (16/1 with Unibet) and Mark Allen (25/1 with Unibet) cannot be wholly discounted, whilst even further down the field there are players with serious ability who could be capable of causing a shock.
In this modern day and age the depth of quality in the game of snooker is astounding. We saw that at the UK Championship in December, when Liang Wenbo made the final and relative unknown David Grace got as far as the semis. The expanded world tour has given a huge number of players the chance to play against top opponents on a regular basis and earn enough money to play snooker full time. These two factors have created a highly competitive tour which is great fun to watch, but can make predicting the winner just a little trickier for us bettors!
Thankfully, however, in this respect the Masters is a little kinder to those who like a bet on snooker. This tournament is only open to the top 16 players in the world so the shocks we have seen on the multi-table format of other events just won’t happen at “Ally Pally”.
The Masters has always been a hugely prestigious event, ever since its inception in 1975 and this year’s tournament was given a boost by the news that Ronnie O’Sullivan would play. The Rocket was instantly, and amazingly to some, installed as the favourite in the outright winner market. Despite not having played any competitive snooker since the World Championship in April, the unadulterated class of Ronnie means the bookies predict he is the one to watch.
He’s won the game’s biggest non-ranking event five times, including as a 19-year-old back in 1995 and most recently in 2014. He’s also come back from a long break to beat the best before, most notably when defending his crown at the 2013 Worlds after playing just one competitive match all season.
However, we feel he’s just too short in the betting and with age catching up on him we look to the second favourite for our betting tip. Neil Robertson played the best snooker at the UK Championship and deservedly won. Odds of 5/1 are very good value for him to avenge his defeat in last year’s Masters final. He excels in the biggest events, has made the final here three times in the last four years and has an excellent temperament so grab the 5/1 whilst you can.