John Higgins defeated Mark Selby 6-3 to win the first event of the new World Series at Fort Regent in Jersey.

Higgins, who beat Selby 18-13 to win his second world title last year, was held to 3-3 in the early stages but pulled away to victory by winning the last three frames with breaks of 72, 104 and 69.

"It was a good standard and I'm delighted to win because Mark's a quality player," Higgins said.

"It's a great confidence boost to win the first event of a series that's hopefully going to get bigger and better. It's a very proud moment."

Higgins, beaten in each of his last three meetings by Selby, started the match with runs of 56 and 93 to lead 2-0.

Selby, who rose seven places to fourth in the rankings last season, made a 72 break to win the third, levelled at 2-2 and again made it all square by winning the sixth frame for 3-3.

But Higgins then stepped up a gear to land the first title of the four-tournament series, which will end with a grand finals weekend in November for which the winner will pocket £56,000.

"I'm disappointed to lose but John played well at the end and I've had a good weekend," said Selby.

Higgins had only 45 minutes between his 5-2 semi-final victory over Shaun Murphy and the final.

He led Murphy 4-0 but struggled to finish him off in a largely disjointed contest in which Murphy made the highest break, just 64.

Selby trailed Gary Britton, the shock conqueror of Ken Doherty in the first round, 2-0 but made a 105 break in recovering to 2-2.

After that, the reigning Wembley Masters and Welsh Open champion had things all his own way and cruised to a 5-2 victory.

The World Series moves on to Berlin on July 12-13 before calling at Warsaw and Moscow later in the year.

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