Karl Sutton, Jack Whelan, Craig Waddingham and David McNamara all advanced to the semi-finals of the 2022 Pro Series Event 5 after a busy opening day in Blackpool which culminated in a memorable late-night final session.

The unseeded quartet all had to come through the maximum four matches at the Grand Hotel - beginning their campaigns in the morning session – and will return for the semi-finals on Saturday night with Sutton facing Whelan and Waddingham meeting McNamara. The final will follow.

Despite winning the Pairs Cup earlier this year, Sutton has struggled for results as an individual on the Ultimate Pool pro circuit, but 'Karlos' impressed as he enjoyed his best run yet as a singles competitor with the organisation.

The former European Champion dropped just 12 frames throughout the day with victories over Oly Bale 7-4, number one professional Shane Thompson 7-3, reigning Pro Cup champion Jordan Shepherd 7-3 before seeing off winning Pairs Cup teammate Shaun Chipperfield 7-2 in the last eight.

Whelan has the opportunity to win Pro Series titles in consecutive weekends as he made the latter stages of another tournament during his maiden campaign.

The Event 3 winner and former World Champion eliminated Brian Halcrow 7-3 in the prelim before dismissing three Pro Series winners in the shape of Declan Brennan (7-5), Jake McCartney (7-2) and then Chris Melling (7-6) in a dramatic climax where he came back from 6-4 down.

Waddingham is another new professional who has already made waves this season with a run to the final of the Grand Slam and a semi-final finish at Pro Series Event 3.

And now the former World Masters winner will be hopeful of claiming his first top-tier Ultimate Pool silverware after defeats of Arfan Dad (7-5), Jimmy Croxton (7-4), Dan Eaton-Lees (7-3) and Gareth Potts (7-5) put him two further victories away from doing so.

Like Sutton, McNamara has also achieved a personal best on the Pro Series; he navigated Eddie Barker (7-1), Dejan Grech (7-3) and Adam Bassoo (7-4) before holding his nerve to clear in the deciding frame of his quarter-final against number two seed Shaun Storry, after Storry went in-off on his break.

The semi-finals begin at 8pm (20:00GMT) on Saturday night and are exclusively live on ultimatepool.tv. Subscribe here for access.