‘I can’t even speak’ – Robert Milkins wins Welsh Open to scoop £230,000 payday

Robert Milkins beat former world champion Shaun Murphy 9-7 to win the Welsh Open and pocket a £230,000 payday in Llandudno.

The 46-year-old from Gloucester claimed the first prize of £80,000 and a £150,000 bonus for topping the BetVictor Series ranking list, which has run across eight events since last July.

“I can’t even speak, it’s unreal really,” Milkins, who won his first ranking title in 27 years as a professional in the Gibraltar Open 11 months ago, said on Eurosport.

“All through the day I was struggling a bit, same as Shaun. Obviously I had a lot of reason to struggle, it’s a lot of money to me that is.

“I tried to not think about it and to be fair I played all right in the evening (session), but to start off with it was really hard work and if Shaun had been at 20 per cent of his game I’m sure he would have took a lead going into tonight.

“Obviously Gibraltar was brilliant, but beating somebody like Shaun in a best-of-17 in a final, even if he didn’t play well, is just the icing on the cake.”

Murphy, who produced a 147 clearance in his fourth-round defeat of Daniel Wells earlier this week, opened up a 3-1 lead before Milkins hit back to take the next three frames in succession.

A break of 68 helped Murphy level the scores at the end of the first session and the players shared the first two frames of the evening before Milkins won frame 11 on a respotted black.

Breaks of 60 and 64 took Milkins to within a frame of victory and, although Murphy kept the match alive with the only century of the contest, Milkins secured the title with another 64.

“Obviously I’m disappointed,” Murphy said. “I couldn’t have tried any harder, I left it all out there.

“I could have played a bit better but I just didn’t really have it today and all credit to Rob, he was by far the better player.”