Ding Junhui opened 6-2 lead over the Scotish professional snooker player. This is McManus’ first time in the last four since 1993.
This year’s qualifications weighted a lot for the Chinese player who slipped out of the world’s top 16.
Ding impressed in the first two rounds, knocking out Judd Trump and Martin Gould. He also managed to defeat Mark Williams in the quarter-finals 13-3 with a session to spare.
The match against McManus was intensive right from the start, with breaks of 100, 84 and 131, that took him straight to a 3-0 lead. With another 100 break, Ding got 5-0 up before the Scotish player who got on frame six on the board.
The match finished with Ding scoring a 128, for a 6-2 advantage.
