PLAYING a punishing brand of snooker is how Stuart Bingham believes he will beat Ronnie O’Sullivan in tomorrow’s Coral UK Championship semi-final.

The man nicknamed Ball-Run pulled off an escape act to set up the last four clash with the Rocket - coming back from 4-1 and 5-3 down to beat Graeme Dott in a final frame shootout.

Bingham was by no means at his brilliant best but, as he admitted after the match, he produced his best snooker when it mattered most.

A superb plant in the final frame paved the way for a magnificent match-clinching break of 103 that has secured another showpiece game at the York Barbican’s one table set-up.

Catching glimpses of O’Sullivan’s 6-4 victory over Anthony McGill on the other table in the main arena, Bingham believes his prodigiously talented opponent could be vulnerable in the match’s initial stages.

“I have been seeing he has been missing a few early doors and you have got to punish him,” Bingham said. “It looked like a good game with Anthony.

“I have got to produce a little bit better to have any chance. This is what you dream of - playing someone like Ronnie in the semi-final of the second biggest ranking event going.

“I have got to take my chance and that’s how you punish Ronnie. If you don’t take your chances then he punishes you.

“This is what you practise for. You look at the pro golfers and they have six feet for the Masters and this is it, this is that moment.

“You are playing the best player in the world in the semi-finals of the second biggest tournament. I have equalled what I did last year.

“I want to go one step further to get to the final of a major UK tournament. I have had a final in Australia, in Shanghai, and a couple more. To do it in the UK would be a bit special.”

On his comeback, which looked unlikely with Dott in charge during the first half of the match, Bingham added: “I just hung in there. At 4-1 down, it was one of those days. Things that could have gone wrong were going wrong. It just wasn’t happening.

“I managed pinch one, to go 4-2, and even though I went 5-3 down it still wasn’t over. I produced my best snooker when I was behind.

“I am over the moon, ecstatic and I can’t believe it. I was sat in my chair at 5-5, looked at the score, and thought ‘how am I 5-5?’

"I felt good but just a bit spaced out. I don’t know how I got through that.”

Dott said he didn’t believe the “snooker gods” wanted him to win the match as he now comes to terms with missing the Masters next month. 

"At 4-1 I was in the balls to go 5-1 and I got a kick, it was definitely going to be 5-1 and I think the match is done then,” he said.

“You start to think that maybe it's not going to be your day and then potting that red and going in-off the middle and leaving a plant (in the final frame) just summed the whole game up.”

Dott, who came though a final frame decider in the last 16 after being 5-0 up against Neil Robertson, added: “It's just the way it goes, I could easily have lost against Neil and it was a bit of luck that I got to win there. I certainly didn't have any luck in that match so it's just the way it goes.

"I'm playing okay, so to fall at the last hurdle is gut-wrenching because I'll miss the Masters now. It's obviously hard but I had to do it last year as well. 

"I knew before I came here that I needed the semis (to make the Masters) so that was always on my mind coming into the tournament."