At Richardson and Westgarth Sports and Social Club last week, Ian McCulloch, fresh from his best ever season qualifying for six of the eight match tournaments in 2001-2002 in which he beat Steve Davis and Anthony Hamilton, was in superb form.

He beat the very promising Teessider, 22-year-old Anthony Parsons, 5-2 with breaks of 46, 50, 51, 56, 91 and culminating with a superb 102 break. Anthony replied with a 45 and 48 break.

In the other match Gary Britain from Middlesbrough beat professional Paul Davidson from Pickering 5-1 helped by breaks of 43, 49, 50 and 95. Davidson replied with breaks of 62 and 65.

David Craggs went into a 3-0 lead against David Lilley. Lilley replied with a 110 break to go into the interval 3-1 down. He then put together breaks of 44, 61 and 84 to level the match at 4-4. David Craggs then made an excellent 79 to clinch a great match 5-4.

M Rhodes and Terry Singleton were in a match that went first one way then the other at 4-4. It was anyone's game.

This week Mike Dunn produced an awesome performance of snooker against Kuldesh Johal, who in the previous round had been so impressive some fans had thought he could win the tournament, but Mike Dunn had other thoughts. With clinical efficiency he produced breaks of 47 and 79 in one frame followed by breaks of 50, 79, 96 and 100 break to beat a shell-shocked Johal 5-0.

He replied with breaks of 40 and 48, but to no avail. On this form he was capable of beating just about anyone. His performance thrilled a capacity crowd.

In the other match Peter Lines from Leeds produced an efficient performance to beat Chris West from Whitley Bay 5-1 and set up an intriguing semi-final with fellow professional Mike Dunn to be played on Monday, July 15.

In the best match of the tournament to date Ian McCulloch played Gary Brittain from Middlesbroguh. McCulloch knocked in two centuries and 105 and a 106 to go 3-1 up. G. Brittain came back with a 56 and 72 to level the match, but McCulloch proved too strong with breaks of 47 and 72 to win 5-2. Mike Rhodes had a comfortable victory over Dave Craggs 5-2 to set up a semi-final match with Ian McCulloch on Wednesday, July 17, best of 11 frames.