Maguire Leaves O'brien Trailing to Confirm His Comeback

Stephen Maguire beat Fergal O'Brien 9-5 at the Waterfront Hall in Belfast last night to win the £30,000 first prize in the Northern Ireland Trophy and rise to third in the provisional rankings behind Shaun Murphy, No1 for the first time, and John Higgins.

Maguire won the European Open and UK titles in 2004 before his career lost momentum but victories over the defending champion, Ding Junhui, Australia's Neil Robertson and Murphy in the semi-finals set the 26-year-old Scot against the Irishman O'Brien, whose only ranking event win was the British Open in 1999.

The 35-year-old Dubliner last appeared in a major final when losing 10-9 to the late Paul Hunter in the 2001 Masters but this week he belied his current ranking of 37th with a 5-4 win over Higgins, a 5-2 victory over Ronnie O'Sullivan and a 6-3 semi-final win against Northern Ireland's outstanding 21-year-old prospect Mark Allen.

Yesterday, however, O'Brien was more prone to errors and also suffered a couple of untimely visitations of bad luck. Maguire's performance, though not flawless in winning frames from his first clear- cut opportunity, was the more solid.

Having trailed 2-1, Maguire led 4-3 at the interval and never came under sustained pressure in the evening session when he won five of the seven frames to secure his third ranking title.

"It's unbelievable winning this title," said Maguire. "It's been nearly three years since I've won a title and I've beat some great players all week. A few years ago I was struggling, so to come back and win another title is fantastic."

Meanwhile, in the Araneta Coliseum in Manila, venue of the 1975 Muhammad Ali/Joe Frazier Thrilla in Manila, Daryl Peach, a 35-year-old from Blackpool who turned to pool after failing to make the grade on the snooker circuit, was beating a home-town hero Roberto Gomez 17-15 to win the World Nine Ball Championship as a 150-1 outsider from a field of 128 representing 45 countries.

The most dramatic moment of Peach's progress to the final came in the penultimate game of his quarter-final against Francisco Bustamante, who was celebrating potting match ball out of a snooker only for the referee, Nigel Rees, to call a foul on the grounds that another ball had been touched first. After television replays and a delay of almost 15 minutes Peach went on to win 11-10 and beat Hungary's Vilmos Foldes 12-11 in the semis. Peach's friend from Blackpool, Karl Boyes, lost to Gomez 11-4 in the other semi.