Zhao Xintong has half a foot in the semifinals of the 2025 Snooker World Championships, and the British media believes that he is expected to make history

In the second stage of the quarterfinals of the 2025 Snooker World Championships that ended in the early morning of the 30th, Beijing time, Chinese player Zhao Xintong won 6 games after leading Wakelin 6:2 in the first stage, and the current game lead came to 12:4, only one game away from reaching the semifinals of this tournament.

If Zhao Xintong gives full play to his offensive advantages, he has every chance to continue to step on the shoulders of his opponent and advance to the finals

British media said after the game that Zhao Xintong was close to a victory over Wakelin, and Zhao Xintong's form and strong performance against Wakelin showed that he is likely to become the first amateur player in snooker history to taste the top at the Crucible Theatre. While Wakelin has beaten 2010 champion Neil Robertson and former world No. 1 Mark Allen to reach the quarter-finals of the tournament, the Englishman finds himself completely no match for Zhao Xintong in the first two stages of the tournament that ended on Tuesday.

When the 33-year-old Wakelin scored 93 points in a single stroke on the morning of the 29th local time to win the first game, Zhao Xintong taught his opponent a lesson by winning 6 games in a row. That pattern continued when the match resumed in the evening, and the 28-year-old was working his way to reaching the semi-finals of the World Championship for the first time. If Zhao Xintong reaches the semi-finals, he will face the winner of the other quarter-final between O'Sullivan and Si Jiahui. If Zhao Xintong gives full play to his offensive advantages, he has every chance to continue to step on the shoulders of his opponent and advance to the finals.

Former British Championship champion Zhao Xintong is one of 10 Chinese players to be banned for a match-fixing scandal. He was the only player out of ten who did not directly manipulate the game, but became the one to be the other player to manipulate two snooker matches. Zhao Xintong has been banned for 20 months for these irregularities and is the only one of the 10 players sanctioned in the scandal who has returned to the game.

Due to the ban, Zhao Xintong lost his qualification for the World Snooker Tour, although he has already secured that he will return to the tour stage full-time next season. In the 2025 World Championships, Zhao Xintong was officially listed as an amateur. The battle against Wakelin was Zhao Xintong's seventh match of the tournament, after Zhao Xintong passed four qualifying rounds before entering the main event.