Snooker: Paul Davison hopes to face Judd Trump in German Masters (From Gazette & Herald)

Snooker: Paul Davison hopes to face Judd Trump in German Masters

3:24pm Wednesday 1st February 2012 in Sport

PICKERING potter Paul Davison knows only a professional performance will earn him the opportunity to meet UK snooker champion Judd Trump at the German Masters this week.

Davison won three qualifying matches to reach the final stages of the ranking event, held at the Tempodrom in Berlin, and the carrot of a last-32 encounter with the game’s hottest sensation awaits on Thursday morning.

But first, he must overcome Pole Krzysztof Wrobel in a wildcard round over the best-of-nine frames the previous afternoon to get a shot at the world number five, who won snooker’s second biggest tournament at York’s Barbican last month.

This is the first time the 40-year-old North Yorkshire professional has qualified for the televised rounds of a ranking tournament since losing 3-1 to Jimmy White in the last 48 of the World Open in Scotland in September 2010.

“It’s a match you should probably win,” Davison said of his clash with Wrobel. “But if you don’t play well you can be beaten so you have to put in a professional performance. Trump is the man to beat at the moment.

“He won the UK at York so I am really looking forward to it. I can’t wait to get going. I have to make sure I get through (the wildcard) and get to the last 32 proper.”

Davison, currently ranked 86th in the world, could do with a strong performance as he bids to secure his place on the professional tour next season. Players outside of the top 64 face the prospect of having to win their tour card at QSchool – a series of tournaments held at the World Snooker Academy in May.

Determined to make the most of the opportunity, he has upped his already gruelling practice schedule of five to six hours a day to ensure he is firing on all cylinders before he jets off to Germany. And he insisted he wasn’t there to make up the numbers. Davison, pictured, wants to beat Trump and cause a big shock.

“When you are slightly lower down the rankings, where I am, these points are vital and can push you up a dozen or two dozen places,” he explained. “Hopefully, it won’t stop at the last 32 and I can go on and try and get to the last day – the semi-finals or the final.”

Of Trump, he said: “There are weaknesses in everyone’s game but he does go for an awful lot of shots and, if they are not going in, that’s what I have got to capitalise on. When he is missing, I have to put him under pressure with my safety and force errors from him.

“You have to concentrate on your own game, do what you do best and the results will come. Getting to the final stages of these events means everything. There’s no reason at all why I can’t win.”