By Julian Shea BBC Sport at The Crucible

Stevens won a war of nerves with Hendry

Resuming at 8-8, Stevens won the first frame 93-0 but Hendry held his nerve in a tense next frame to restore parity after both players made errors.

At 11-9 up, Hendry missed a great chance and Stevens won a cagey colours duel to cut the gap to 11-10.

Errors grew more common as the tension mounted but Stevens was the calmer man.

Stevens was delighted to reach his fifth Crucible semi-final in six years.

"It wasn't the best match in the world and it was tense at the end. I managed to dig in in the last session and it was pleasing," said the Welshman.

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"I'm due to get to the final again. I've lost three close semi-finals, but I'm looking forward to this one.

'I was favourite to beat Graeme Dott in the semis last year but lost. I'm going to put that to the back my mind."

A distraught Hendry said his entire Crucible campaign had been a poor one.

"I didn't play well. I played poorly in the first match, poorly in the second match, and apart from four frames, poorly in this match," he said.

"You can't expect to win the championship playing like that.

"I don't know what to do to cut out the silly mistakes. It's not a twitch, it's just a sheer lack of concentration."

S HENDRY (Sco) 11-13 M STEVENS (Wal)

31-70 (64) 8-74 4-63 (55) 84-7 0-114 (94) 47-70 71-40 (56) 77-18 (54) 138-0 (138) 86-54 (86,54) 114-20 (114) 68-21 (59) 5-78 0-75 (70) 81-32 (54) 21-68 0-93 85-30 73-17 106-20 (56) 54-65 31-71 (66) 49-77 0-93 (67)