Ronnie O'Sullivan sparkles at Halo World Championship to net big lead over He Guoqiang after first Crucible session

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Ronnie O'Sullivan is up and running at the 2026 Halo World Snooker Championship, recovering from an early gaffe during his arena walk-on to romp into a 7-2 lead over China's He Guoqiang after their first session at the Crucible.

Drama as phone rings, He commits push shot and O'Sullivan clears brilliantly

Video credit: TNT Sports

O'Sullivan encountered little resistance from the debutant as he raced five frames clear, but He eventually found his World Championship rhythm to sprinkle a seed of doubt in the seven-time champion's mind.

The scoreboard threatened to tip back in favour of the underdog at 5-2, but The Rocket powered to the finish line to leave the Chinese cueist with a mountain to climb in the second session on Wednesday.

You can catch all the action from the conclusion of their first-round tussle on TNT Sports and HBO Max, with coverage starting from 14:15 UK time on TNT Sports 3.

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The opening exchanges saw O'Sullivan clamber into a 2-0 advantage via relatively untroubled breaks of 72 and 97, though the third frame proved a little harder to capture.

An unusual push shot from He afforded O'Sullivan a free ball and an opportunity to steal, both of which he grabbed with two hands.

From a nail-biter to a crowd-pleaser, the 50-year-old - playing at his 34th consecutive Crucible tournament - turned on the style to compile the highest break of the match, and its sole century, with a 113 gut punch.

O'Sullivan flaunts 'full repertoire' with stupendous century against He

Video credit: TNT Sports

On his maiden World Championship appearance, He must have feared the worst when O'Sullivan emerged from the mid-session interval in a relentless mood, even if The Rocket needed a couple of bites to devour the fifth frame.

But the 25-year-old did manage to halt his opponent, if only temporarily, eking out his first frame before producing an admirable break of 77 - his highest of the session - whilst preventing O'Sullivan from potting a ball for over 30 minutes.

And despite starting brightly in his efforts to reduce the gap to two, He saw O'Sullivan pounce on a couple of errors after escaping from a bizarre fluked snooker and make it 6-2.

'Unbelievable' He fluke leaves O'Sullivan in peculiar snooker

Video credit: TNT Sports

From there, The Rocket demonstrated his class to end his afternoon on a high, sinking his highest break - 86 - since his fourth-frame masterclass.

There were a couple of head-scratching moments from O'Sullivan, including an amusing walk-on blunder and a gasp-inducing mis-hit,

But O'Sullivan will surely be pleased with his day's work, needing just two more frames to set up a spine-tingling last-16 clash with fellow Class of '92 graduate John Higgins.

Check out our live blog for how it all happened.

You can watch every day of the 2026 World Snooker Championship live on TNT Sports. It is available both live and on-demand on HBO Max.

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