UK champion Ding Junhui ends long wait for trophy at York Barbican

Ding may hail from China, but the 32-year-old has made Sheffield his home since he came to England as a teenager.

And he enjoyed the local support in the York Barbican crowd to secure a 10-6 Betway UK Championship final win over Stephen Maguire and pocket the £200,000 top prize.

It completed the hat-trick of UK titles for Ding, elevating him to elite status as only four other players – Ronnie O’Sullivan (seven), Steve Davis (six), Stephen Hendry (five) and John Higgins (three) – have won this competition at least three times.

The only surprise – after a final that finished with the players sharing four successive centuries – was why Ding has not won a ranking title for two years, which has seen the former world No 1 slip down the rankings.

“This is very special,” said Ding. “It has been two years and I have done nothing, but I have played very well this week.

“I worried about not doing well and asked myself, ‘can I win again?’

“But this week I played so well and beat Ronnie O’Sullivan on the way to the final. I started to believe that I could lift the trophy again.”

Ding resumed on Sunday night leading 5-3 in their best-of-19 match, and the 32-year-old extended his advantage to 7-3, including an 83 break.

But Maguire had shown in Saturday’s semi-final win over Mark Allen – where he romped to a 6-0 victory – that he has the ability to score heavily on a consistent basis.

So few inside the Barbican were surprised to see the 38-year-old from Glasgow reel off three century breaks in the next four frames.

A 103 break made it 7-4, before Ding replied with a 67 to head into the mid-session interval needing just two more frames to land his 14th ranking title.

But whatever Maguire had in his interval cuppa certainly worked wonders as he fired off breaks of 103 – after a poor miss on the black from Ding – before an even better 124 to trail 8-6.

But Ding – who surprisingly had not claimed a ranking title since the 2017