Left to right, Chen Zhe, Mei Xiwen, Zhang Anda and Li Yan.

The first Q School is now over. Li Yan successfully made it through but our other players will now be let loose on the PTC events, starting in June.

Q School 1

Agony for two of the Grove’s four Chinese players taking part, as Zhang Anda and Chen Zhe came within one match of a place on the Main Tour 2011/12.

Players need to get through five qualifying rounds to make it to the Tour, and both players duly depastched their first four opponents – Anda beating Alex Taubman (making a 116, the competition’s first century break), David Portman, Thepchaiya Un-Nooh and Kyren Wilson, all by the scoreline of 4 frames to 1. Zhe beat Ben Harrison 4-1, Michael Wasley 4-2, Stuart Carrington 4-1 and Ian Burns 4-2.

However both players met formidable opponents in the crucial final round, Anda losing 1-4 to David Grace and Zhe getting so close but losing 3-4 to Andrew Norman. Congratulations to David and Andrew who were joined by Adam Wicheard and Finland’s Robin Hull, all four players making it through to the Main Tour.

The other two Grove players, Mei Xiwen and Li Yan, met in the first round with Xiwen winning 4-2. Xiwen then beat Kishran Hirani 4-2 before losing 1-4 to Jamie O’Neill.

Q School 2

Great news for Li Yan – the first Grove player to qualify for the Main Tour via the Q School.

Yan received a bye to the second round and then defeated Tony Knowles 4-0, Vinnie Calabrese 4-0 and Kyren Wilson 4-3 before meeting David Gray in the last 8. He wrapped up a 4-1 win on Sunday morning to take his place on next season’s Tour.

Chen Zhe advanced to round three with a 4-0 win against Stephen Ellis and a 4-1 victory over Jak Jones, but was defeated in the last 32 by former professional Lee Spick, 2-4.

Mei Xiwen received a bye to round two but was defeated 2-4 by Ireland’s David Morris. Bad news for Zhang Anda too, who was unable to repeat his form of the first event as he crashed out in the first round 3-4 to Shahram Changezi.

Q School 3

Zhang Anda made it through to round 4 after beating Jamie O’Neill 4-2, Ian Glover 4-1 and Vinnie Calabrese 4-3. However he came up against a tough opponent in Stephen Craigie in round 4 and after quickly falling 0-3 behind ended up with a 2-4 defeat.

Mei Xiwen received a bye to the 2nd round where he beat George Marter 4-1 but then lost to Alex Davies 3-4.

After his heroics from previous rounds Chen Zhe wasn’t able to progress past round 1 this time, losing 1-4 to Rob James.