Reigning champion Judd Trump sent crashing out of Saudi by world number 68 Oli Lines in shock defeat

World number one Trump was playing his opening match of this year’s £2.3 million world ranking event, but his stay in Jeddah will be a short one as his title defence was ended at the first hurdle by good friend Lines.

Trump won frame one, but Lines - who had already come through three rounds at the Green Halls - responded with a break of 125 to get on the scoreboard. The underdog then went in front before a run of 63 helped him go to the mid-session interval 3-1 up.

On resumption, Lines continued to play beautifully as a 71 assisted him to a 4-1 advantage and move just one frame away from the winning target.

At the same stage of last year’s inaugural Saudi Arabia Masters, Trump battled back from an even graver situation when he strung together five consecutive frames from 4-0 down to deny Wu Yize.

Trump went on to reach the final where he produced an all-time clutch counter clearance of 72 in the deciding frame to oust Mark Williams 10-9 and collect the trophy and £500,000 top prize.

Perhaps encouraged by those recent escape acts, an out-of-sorts Trump took a low-scoring sixth frame before finding some fluency in frame seven with a break of 102 to make it 4-3.

With the contest back in the balance though, Lines - who had been wobbling a bit - steadied himself and compiled a classy effort of exactly 100 to complete one of the biggest results of his career.

Lines is now guaranteed at least £30,000 for reaching the last 16 which represents his largest payday in the sport.

His opponent on Wednesday in round five will be the in-form Ali Carter, who pipped Gary Wilson 5-4 on one of the other tables.

Due to Xiao Guodong electing to miss the Jeddah event in order to play at the World Games on home soil in China, world number 17 Carter was bumped up as a top 16 seed and avoided the bother of having to play in rounds three and four.

A similar situation occurred at the recent Shanghai Masters where Carter narrowly missed the initial top 16 cut, but because of Mark Allen withdrawing due to family reasons, Carter was first in line to receive a call-up. He went on to make the final, where he was only two frames shy of the title.

Please visit our 2025 Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters tournament information centre here for the draw, results and other details on the event.