Ronnie O’Sullivan: GOAT has nothing to prove but he has glorious chance of eighth World Snooker Championship title

Ronnie O'Sullivan's 13-10 defeat to Luca Brecel in their World Championship quarter-final at the Crucible was a major shock, but the outcome is only likely to inspire the snooker GOAT to return stronger for next season, writes Desmond Kane. O'Sullivan will also start the 2023/24 campaign as world No. 1 if Mark Allen fails to defeat Mark Selby in the semi-finals in Sheffield.

Prior to his annual spring break in blooming Sheffield, Ronnie O’Sullivan was in a philosophical mood about his quest for a record eighth World Championship crown.

“It’s a big ask mate, it’s a big ask, isn’t it? At some point, I’ll just let the snooker gods decide,” he told me.

Ah, those pesky celestial beings from a mythological Crucible Theatre where an ethereal ‘Steady’ Eddie Charlton plays with an average shot time of 17 seconds from here to eternity and free-wheeling Welshman Cliff Wilson pots the lot.

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If the snooker gods do exist in another realm, they do not take kindly to otherworldly talents squandering God-given gifts.

As Ronnie – the oldest champion of the modern era with an 18-13 win over Judd Trump at the age of 46 years and 148 days a year ago – discovered in his record 100th match at the sport’s ultimate event, the snooker gods giveth and they taketh away.

Like Hermes having his winged sandals clipped, O’Sullivan was reduced to the role of mere mortal by the heavenly potting power of Luca Brecel, a man dubbed the ‘Belgian Bullet’ who went on a bender before the quarter-final and played like a bloke still operating under the devilishly heady glow of a flagon full of Duvel.

Whatever is made of Brecel’s powerhouse performance as his cup runneth over in a 13-10 upset win of epic proportions, it was also an act of remarkable sporting self-harm by O’Sullivan, whose wand of a cue was drained of its powers by a series of blunders that scarcely seemed believable.

‘I didn’t think it was possible’ – White and McManus analyse O’Sullivan’s surprise defeat to Brecel

Video credit: TNT Sports

This has all visited O’Sullivan before at the Crucible, most notably in the 2005 World Championship quarter-finals when he blew an 8-2 lead against Peter Ebdon to lose 13-10 and the 2006 semi-finals against Graeme Dott when he succumbed 17-11, losing all eight frames of the third session from 8-8 amid terminal issues with his cue tip.

He also shipped the final eight frames against John Parrott in a 13-3 defeat in the last 16 in 1994, but that came when he was only a raw 18-year-old talent without a world title to his name.

The boys in the bubble thought those days were long gone until Black Wednesday saw Rocket Ronnie collapse in a farce ripe for Crucible audiences beyond its most famous function as a snooker hall for 17 days every April.

In hindsight, it is probably a blessing Ronnie did not hire a TV crew to tail him this year as his latest campaign turned into right old Carry On up the Crucible. A bit like going from Michael Jordan’s Last Dance to a Shakespearean black ball comedy of errors, minus big Bill Werbeniuk splitting his strides performing a tricky rest shot, in less than a year.

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At times, his confused facial expressions resembled peak Norman Wisdom as accepted wisdom regarding his status as tournament favourite dissipated.

He had numerous chances to finalise the victory, but squandered them all, lost seven straight frames from 10-6 clear and was bundled out the Crucible stage door in only 79 untimely minutes. It is fair to say, win or lose, Ronnie doesn’t do anything by half measures.

Which continues to make him the box office draw beyond anything else in the building.

John Higgins and Mark Selby, grinders to the bitter end, were still negotiating their third frame of a gruelling second session on the other table while Ronnie was trying to make sense of a demise delivered with enough shock and awe tactics to leave onlookers dumfounded.

“It’s hard to win this tournament if I don’t flow,” he told reporters. “There is only so much hanging on you can do at the Crucible. It catches up on you. Eventually, someone plays well against you and puts you away.

“In some ways, it’s a blessing that I didn’t have to carry on playing because it was hard work. I wasn’t really firing.”

The sting of this peculiar defeat will probably hurt in his quieter moments, as it should for every great sportsman, but O’Sullivan should not be too harsh on himself when the celebratory confetti settles on the table to declare a new world champion on Monday evening. Or an old one if Selby prospers for a fifth time.

There has been some ill-informed tosh spouted about O’Sullivan before this World Championship about what he has contributed to snooker since turning professional in 1992 with a distracted Hossein Vafaei even appearing to lose the point of what he was trying to achieve in South Yorkshire.

Those who say he is bad for the game fail to respect O’Sullivan’s ability to generate headlines, attention and interest beyond the sport.

He is a great talker for snooker who can also walk the walk for the vast majority of time in battle, a proven champion with the most formidable record in World Championship history. And much of what he says should be not greeted with phoney moral outrage.

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At the age of 47, O’Sullivan has brought as much to the table as Tiger Woods in golf and Roger Federer has showered upon tennis. In such a respect, he has nothing left to prove to anybody. Apart from himself, of course in the long run.

He is not interested in officialdom, is far from a traditional ambassador and is not always right, but he speaks his mind. Which is welcome in a day and age of bland non-entities towing the party line.

When you think of snooker, you immediately think of Ronnie O’Sullivan. Which says enough about his outstanding contribution to his calling in life.

"Some have said he has brought the game into disrepute, but Ronnie brings the game into fine repute," said Barry Hearn, his former manager and former World Snooker Tour chairman, after O'Sullivan opted to make a 146 rather than a maximum at the 2016 Welsh Open.

"In his little head, he thought it would be funny. He is quite dry. The 147 is a the pinnacle, but Ronnie has made loads of them, he has got loads of money.

"He is the biggest character in the sport. When he breaks the rules, he gets punished, in this case, it was his choice.

"No-one is bigger than the game, but Ronnie is close because he is a fabulous player and a fun personality."

He continues to carry the game into his 48th year with a devotion to his craft that should not be allowed to go unnoticed with an unswerving dedication and incomparable longevity.

He has advanced the importance of bringing entertainment to the masses and stands alongside Alex ‘Hurricane’ Higgins and Jimmy ‘Whirlwind’ White as genuine crowd-pleasers who have changed the face of snooker since the Crucible first housed the World Championship in 1977.

Like Higgins and White back in the day, he has garnered a greater popularity for the old green baize beyond working-class blokes potting balls in darkened halls set against the sweat of heavy industry.

The 1980s televised boom period will never be replicated, but O’Sullivan has also helped snooker through some tortuous times as its headline act. Most notably when the UK government's ban on tobacco sponsorship left the old green baize needing a puffer immediately after the 2005 World Championship.

Leaving a legacy is not merely about winning or totting up records.

It is about how you performed your sport that encourages the next generation to mimic what you offered. How you engaged with the public beyond those who briefly tap into the sport when the Crucible comes around every year.

As we see at this World Championship, a tournament first won by Joe Davis in 1927, in the form of the fast-moving Brecel of Belgium and Si Jiahui of China contesting a semi-final in their 20s, attacking, creative, uninhibited sport is an ideal worth pursuing.

Every young player should aspire to play the game the way O’Sullivan does. It is how snooker should be performed to protect the ancient art for countless wannabes across every cue sports for future talents to try their hand at touching greatness.

With a record 39 ranking titles carried off and 1,202 centuries compiled so far, he is the sport’s undisputed GOAT. This despite acknowledging those historic numbers could have been healthier if he had applied himself better in his formative years.

The old adage that youth is wasted on the young and young Rocket Ronnie is never truer than in the life and times of O’Sullivan.

When you consider his lifetime body of work set against previous generations, there has been nobody like him over the past four decades of disturbing reds and making up for lost time.

Stephen Hendry neatly bookended his world collection between 1990 and 1999, but never conquered the Crucible beyond the age of 30.

Steve Davis was the six-time winning machine from the 1980s, but found himself washed up a decade later. He never lifted a seventh beyond the age of 31.

O’Sullivan continues to excel when the mood takes him, but is fallible just like the rest of us when the sun isn't shining. There was a deluge of desperation as O’Sullivan remarkably failed to construct a break over 30 in the final fateful session against Brecel.

Yet it is unfair to be overly critical when we judge men like O'Sullivan against history as much as the competition. The public always expect more from sporting deities who are only human.

“I will probably come here for the next three or four years, probably play well in one of those occasions and that will be my chance,” he said.

“But I am not driven by it. I have to keep answering those questions because I know everybody wants to talk about it, but I have a good perspective on my life.”

Brecel reflects on 'unbelievable' victory over O'Sullivan and Hendry being his 'hero'

Video credit: TNT Sports

The World Championship is not the Ronnie O’Sullivan show. Even if it feels like it.

They do not hand out world titles for artistic merit. Even if he has brought a spiritual element to snooker like nobody else in the sport.

Some commentators doubted if he would go beyond three world titles, and plenty wondered if he would surpass five.

There remains the time and talent for Ronnie to go over the top in taking out the World Championship for a record eighth time after scaling the summit in 2001, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2013, 2020 and 2022.

"I’m not really that disappointed. I wish I was, but you kind of get to the point where you're like: 'Why am I playing snooker?'," he told Eurosport.

"I love the lifestyle, I love my life, I love everything I do with snooker. I don’t just play snooker. Part of it is playing, I've accepted that to not get too down on myself.

"It’s just a snooker match at the end of the day."

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Video credit: TNT Sports

Perhaps those snooker gods, still analysing the relative value of Cliff Thorburn v Terry Griffiths finishing at 3.51am in the 1983 World Championship with the patience of a saint, will look kindly upon the sport’s timeless golden child this time next year.

"There are ebbs and flows. All you can do is work hard, do what you’ve got to do and try to stay fresh, try to stay ready for your time," he said.

If the hunger and desire match his ability, he stands a better than even chance of reaching Valhalla.

In the reality of the here and now, the world of snooker continues to belong to O'Sullivan and everything in it.

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