China's Ding to meet Gould at snooker worlds first round

China's former world No. 1 Ding Junhui will play Martin Gould in the first round of the world snooker championships to open here on Saturday.

Ding, now ranked 17th, had to come through the qualifying rounds to enter the main draw for the 1.5million pounds tournament at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield.

His compatriot Liang Wenbo, ranked 18th in the world, faces newly-crowned China Open champion Judd Trump and the other Chinese player Zhang Anda takes on former runner-up Barry Hawkins.

Mark Fu, from Hong Kong, China, meets former world champion Peter Ebdon.

Elsewhere, Mark Williams faces Graeme Dott in a battle of two former champions.

Stuart Bingham will start the defence of his world championship title with a tough match against Ali Carter on Saturday.

Bingham beat Shaun Murphy in the final last year and is now trying to break the Curse of the Crucible by becoming the only first-time winner to successfully defend the title.

Carter, who was runner-up in 2008 and 2012, has dropped out of the world's top 16 but won three matches in the qualifying rounds to secure his Crucible spot. Carter has won the last six matches between the pair.

That match will start at 10am on Saturday with the concluding session at 7pm.