2024 Scottish Open Snooker Qualifiers: Louis Heathcote gets off to a flying start

Hot on the heels of the Northern Ireland Open that finished in Belfast on Sunday night, the third Home Nations Series event of the season got underway on Monday morning at Ponds Forge in Sheffield. The opening two rounds of this tournament - featuring players outside the top 32 seeding positions for it - take place across three days in Yorkshire.

The 32 players to emerge from these initial rounds qualify for the televised stages in Edinburgh between December 9-15, where the top seeds enter the fray in round three (last 64). For more details on the 2024 Scottish Open, including the draw, results, format, prize money and how to watch, please visit here.

World number 71 Heathcote enjoyed a career best run in the recent Northern Ireland Open, winning five matches in it before being stopped by Elliot Slessor in the quarter-finals. The Leicester cueman has immediately built on that campaign as he made breaks of 79, 69 and 65 in his round one victory, during which he only allowed Thomond to score a total of 20 points throughout the entire tie.

There were two big comebacks during the opening day of action as both Andrew Pagett and Mostafa Dorgham recovered from 3-0 deficits to win 4-3 against Dylan Emery and Liam Pullen, respectively.

Wang Yuchen - who defeated Jack Lisowski at the Waterfront Hall last week - was nearly on the receiving end of such a turnaround, but came through a deciding frame having seen his opponent Liam Davies battle back from 3-0 behind.

Switzerland’s Alexander Ursenbacher was in the same situation against Michael Holt, but he too resisted his opponent’s rally in the end.

In one of the highest quality contests of the day, Lei Peifan pipped Haydon Pinhey by the odd frame. Fresh from his last 16 appearance in Belfast, Lei was helped by efforts of 65 and 71 as he won the final two frames from 3-2 down. Rookie professional Pinhey had posted contributions of 74, 61 and 80 earlier in the match.

India's number one on the World Snooker Tour Ishpreet Singh Chadha ousted the USA's Ahmed Elsayed via a deciding frame. Chadha made the semi-finals of the first Home Nations Series event of the term at the English Open in Brentwood last month.

Polish rookie Antoni Kowalski strung together four consecutive frames from two nil down to defeat Gong Chenzhi, 4-2. In an all-teenage encounter, Stan Moody - who is currently third on the one-year list for those outside the top 64 rankings - ended the challenge of Iulian Boiko, by the same verdict.

Allan Taylor and Zak Surety each hit a break of 105 during 4-0 wins.

Liu Hongyu, Andrew Higginson, Rory Thor, Dean Young, Julien Leclercq, Stuart Carrington, Huang Jiahao, Jiang Jun, Ben Mertens, Ian Burns, Amir Sarkhosh and Farakh Ajaib were the other players who progressed to the second round of this £550,400 ranking competition.

Ross Muir received a walkover due to Ken Doherty withdrawing. It is believed that Doherty is recovering from a reported hernia operation he urgently received several days ago.