Ding harvests as pain-suffering Selby breezes through second round

Chinese ace snooker Ding Junhui enjoyed a solid form on Wednesday as he harvested a 5-1 victory over Mark Davis in the second round of China Open as well as heartful birthday blessing from his fans.

As Ding showed up at the main table, the packed audience started to sing "Happy Birthday" to him.

And the blessed Ding achieved three breaks of over 50 points en route to beating Mark Davis of Britain 5-1 and booking a third-round tie against Mark Williams.

"Thank you for accompanying me in the past ten years," Ding said on Chinese social media Weibo in the morning to embrace his 28th birthday.

Ding made his fame in the same tournament in 2005, which saw him establish himself as one of the world top players before he rose to top of the world ranking last year.

However, Ding suffered six straight first-round defeats this year until his victory over Marcus Campbell in the first round on Monday.

Also on Wednesday, Mark Selby overcame neck pains to thwart English snooker Elliot Slessor's attempt to reach the third round for the first time with a 5-0 victory.

"Stay motionless too long, then it might stiff again," said Selby who has been suffering neck injury since 2012.

The pain struck back again in the first round of the event this year. Yet Selby found his way to dent it.

"It was the same position so I assume it was the same injury," said Selby, who consulted his physician back home and began to practice stretching exercises he did before.

"Hopefully it was just like a muscle strain and nothing too serious," he added. Endi