PETER EBDON, the UK champion at York in 2006, will not be appearing at the Barbican this year after being thumped 6-1 by Luca Brecel in the final round of qualifiers at Sheffield’s World Snooker Academy, writes Steve Carroll.

The world number 20, who beat Stephen Hendry 10-6 to take the crown six years ago, was never in the match against the promising young Belgian, who will take his place in the televised stages when the williamhill.com sponsored UK Championship begins in the Minster city on December 1.

There were no such worries, though, for veteran Steve Davis.

The 55-year-old, who suffered an almighty scare in his third round encounter with Pankaj Advani, brushed aside Jamie Burnett to keep up an impressive record of qualifying for the game’s second biggest event.

Davis, who has won the tournament on six occasions, has only failed once in his career to make the final stages and Burnett was given short shrift as the Nugget swept into a 4-0 lead.

After conceding the fifth frame, Davis was soon back in command and closed out a 6-2 victory with a classy 128 break.

Jack Lisowski, who made his first 147 maximum break as a professional earlier in the qualifiers against China’s Chen Zhe, saw off Joe Perry 6-4 to get through to the Barbican, while Mark King was emphatic in a 6-0 whitewash of Xiao Guodong.

Mark Joyce shocked Jamie Cope 6-4 and Fergal O’Brien is also through having seen off Dave Gilbert 6-2.

Martin Gould was a 6-3 winner over Ben Woollaston, while Michael Holt cruised to a 6-1 victory over Thepchaiya Un-Nooh.