AUSTRALIAN snooker ace Neil Robertson says he will have happy memories of Exeter after beating Marco Fu in the city.

Robertson beat the man from Hong Kong 4-2 after a protracted battle in snooker's Premier League.

The win was crucial for the affable Aussie to remain in contention for a semi-final place in this year's competition, as he moved up to fifth in the table.

And while Cambridge-based Robertson appeared to take a while to settle into his game, he says he enjoyed playing in the Devon city.

"It's a good place to play and you always remember places you win at for the first time better than others," he said after his victory at the Riverside on Thursday night.

"It's a long drive from Cambridge so I was a little bit tired from the travel, so that was maybe why I wasn't on my game at first.

"But in the last two frames I knocked in three doubles to win it, so from that point of view I was really excited.

"I just wanted to win. You can't always win pretty so it's important to win matches when you don't play so well and this was definitely one of those occasions.

"I knew beforehand if I got a draw or a loss I would be out of the Premier League this season, so the result gives me an outside chance of qualifying for the semi-finals.

"That means I'll remember Exeter for the right reasons rather than the wrong ones."

The talking point of Robertson's hard-fought victory over Fu was his repeated use of superb doubles to clear up the last two frames.

That included a brilliant rebound pot on a re-spotted black after the pair had drawn the fifth frame, which got the crowd on their feet and left Fu flabbergasted.

"Marco won the toss and elected to put me in," explained Robertson. "I told him I was going to play the double and as soon as I hit it I knew it was going in from the reactions of some of the crowd.

"I tend to mess up the safety shots so I quite like playing doubles instead. I probably play them more than most other players.

"I've got an eight-ball and nine-ball background so I picked that up from there."

And the Thunder from Down Under admits he is already focusing on next week's match against Shaun Murphy, which will go some way to deciding if he will make it into this year's last four or not, bringing his stay in the city to an abrupt end.

"I didn't get to see much of Exeter unfortunately," Robertson admitted. "You don't really get a chance to see the sights or see the cities when you're playing in the Premier League because everything is quite quick.

"You're playing again the next week so you need to get home and have a bit of a rest the next day before you start practising again.

"I still need to win my last match against Shaun to have any chance of qualifying for the semis, so it will be interesting.

"But I just need to keep up the practice and the hard work to make sure I get another result next week as well."