CHAMPION Matty Hill is still alive in the Monday Night Snooker Handicap despite the biggest threat to his reign to date.

Hill was within a single pot of being taken to a decider in the quarter-finals by former Evening Mail winner Tony Mason at the Cemetery Cottages

Mason went down 4-2 to the three-times champion, but will have felt he was on the brink of a seventh frame in the Len Irvine-sponsored contest.

With Hill leading 3-2 in the match, Mason, operating with a seven-point start on the handicap, produced a fine 40 break and led 63-29 with only one red remaining.

Hill needed that red, a black, and all the colours to take the frame and, after potting the red with a fine shot, he did just that, taking the frame 64-63 and the match.

The first frame had gone the way of the defending champion 67-15 after breaks of 37 and 29, with Mason levelling after claiming the second 65-19.

A 21 break had Mason well placed in the third, but compilations of 28 and 24 instead saw Hill go 2-1 up.

It was 2-2 after some excellent potting and safety play from the baize veteran saw him to a 77-2 triumph in the fourth, but a 35 break to Hill made it 3-2 before he finished the match off in the sixth frame.

The other quarter-final resulted in a 4-2 success for Denis Horan over John Tyerman.

Horan took the opening two frames 51-41 and 59-18 respectively, but was pegged back to 2-2 as Tyerman took the next pair, with the help of a 28 break in the fourth.

But Horan pulled away thanks to a black-ball finish in the fifth and a 59-24 success in the sixth to reach the last four.

In the doubles, Jon Forristal and Rob Jones defeated Neil Myers 2-0. The first frame was close, but a 27 break from Forristal ensured the victory. Mason met Hill again in the doubles, the former teamed up with Matty Lamb and the latter with Neil Knight.

Hill set off with a 35 break and on his next visit he compiled a fantastic 83 clearance to rapturous applause.

It was one-way traffic in the next as Hill had another great 46 break to take the match 2-0 and make it two triumphs over Mason on the night.

Monday’s Fixtures: Singles: Paul Fieldhouse (+14) v Martin Macdonald; John Forristal v Paul Roberts (+7).

Doubles: Kyle Brown and Gary Barbour v James Jackson and Justin Bates; Tom Millington and Tony Macmillan v John Macmillan and Jordan Park.