Higgins sets up Scottish clash

John Higgins continued his fine comeback after a six-month ban by moving into the quarter-finals of the 12Bet.com UK Championship with a final frame victory over Graeme Dott.

Higgins hit back from behind to scrape a 9-8 win with breaks of 56 and 24 to seal victory and a last eight meeting with fellow Scot Stephen Maguire, who rounded off a 9-7 win over Mark Selby with a break of 135.

Higgins told the BBC: "It's good to be back and I'm motivated full-stop for the second chapter. I just came here to try to win games and tough games are what you want because you know you'll have to play well to win them."

He added: "It was very tough and Graeme doesn't get the credit he deserves for his game. It's such a tough match to win 9-8 and Graeme will be kicking himself because there were a couple of frames I stole from him."

World champion Neil Robertson held off a mini-fightback by Andrew Higginson to move into the last eight with a 9-5 victory.

Higginson hit back from 7-1 down overnight to 7-4 before Robertson recovered his composure. Robertson admitted: "I played a silly shot when I was 7-0 up last night. I thought it was showtime."

Northern Ireland's Mark Allen held off a fightback by defending champion Ding Junhui to claim another final frame decider and move into the last eight.

Allen saw his overnight 6-2 lead cancelled out as Ding clawed his way back to 7-7.

After sharing the next two frames Ding had the first chance with a break of 35 but missed an easy black, allowing Allen in for a match-winning 40.

In the last match of the night Mark Williams recovered from a 5-3 deficit to Stephen Hendry at the start of the concluding session to record a 9-6 victory and also reach the quarter-finals.