27th June 2012
Maguire vs Lawler Betting: Stephen Maguire should have way too much for Rod Lawler in Wuxi opener
Stephen Maguire was thrashed 4-0 in his only match of the season so far in the Asian PTC last week so he will be looking to put that behind him as quickly as possible by progressing into the second round of the Wuxi Classic when he takes on Rod Lawler in the opening round of the first full ranking event of the season on Wednesday. Maguire is a warm 1/3 favourite with William Hill for the match.
Maguire clearly wasn’t himself in the tournament last week and I suspect he only entered it to make sure he was in China early enough to be fully prepared for this tournament. Maguire finished last season very strongly and was unlucky not to win the World Championship. He ran into Ali Carter in the semi final and couldn’t get the better of him having previously thrashed Stephen Hendry and sent him into retirement.
Rod Lawler had to qualify for this tournament which he did successfully and then he had to come through a wildcard match when he got out to China. He came through that against Li Hang 5-2 and now he faces Maguire. To be fair, having needed to four matches before he even got to China, Lawler has done remarkably well to get this far. He will hope his granite like match snooker frustrates Maguire in order to get his chances.
I don’t see Lawler frustrating Maguire here though. Maguire was scoring as well as I’ve ever seen him score at the end of last season and if he hasn’t lost that form in the off season then I would expect this to be a very comfortable match for the Scot. Lawler isn’t going to blow him away. He will try and bore Maguire into submission but Maguire’s scoring should be too heavy for the man from Liverpool.
Back S.Maguire (-2.5 frames) to beat R.Lawler for a 4/10 stake at 2.10 with Ladbrokes
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Author: 'Arry Allsports
