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At the end of another busy season on the snooker circuit, a bit of housekeeping here at PSB and an update as to what will be coming on the site over the course of the coming weeks.

As ever, the end of the season can only mean one thing – it’s player profile update time and over the course of the coming weeks I shall be updating all of the pages to the end of 2012/13, as well as creating profile for players new to the tour in 2012/13.

If you have any suggestions, corrections, photographs or anything else that you would like me to add, please feel free to contact me either by Twitter or by email. In particular, high breaks, career-high rankings and photographs of some of the lower players are welcome.

Elsewhere, I have also added ‘points to defend’ pages for the coming season to my rankings pages for 2013/14, while I will also be adding the tournament calendar to my tournaments section in the coming days.

I have also added a section to my archive pages for the 2013 World Championship, as well as updated the other sections with my best articles and live reports from the 2012/13 season.

Finally, the plan is also to get the comments on the blog fixed in some form or another, unfortunately that is a technical issue and somewhat out of my hands at present.

As ever, thanks to everyone for reading and here is to another action packed season in 2013/14…

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Saturday afternoon saw another four players book their places on the main tour for 2013/14, with victories at the second of this month’s three Q School events. Click below for more…

• Click here to view all of the results from the 2013 Q School

The first man to qualify from event was Hartlepool’s Ryan Clark, who today defeated Zak Surety and Ben Harrison to seal his place on the professional circuit for the next two seasons. A former European under-17′s champion (he defeated Belgian prodigy Luca Brecel to capture that crown back in 2008), Clark has until now largely resisted the temptation to compete in the tour’s PTC events as an amateur and it will be interesting to see how he gets on in the coming months.

Soon to join him was Switzerland’s Alexander Ursenbacher, who saw off former professionals Reanne Evans and Paul Wykes, having also defeated Adam Wicheard yesterday. While the 17-year-old’s PTC results have to date been relatively unremarkable, an event high break of 140 this week, combined with a string of impressive results this week, suggest that he will be one to watch during his professional career. In qualifying for the main tour, he becomes the second Swiss player to have turned professional, following in the footsteps of Darren Paris, who was a pro during the mid-1990′s.

Until now however, there has never been a player from Qatar to grace the main tour, but that will change from next season as Ahmed Saif today became the third qualifier from this event with victories against Anthony Parsons and Jamie Rhys Clarke.

Again, Saif has relatively little experience against snooker’s professionals, indeed his last appearance at a PTC event came at the PTC2 event in 2010, when oddly enough he was defeated by his Clarke, his final round opponent today.

Finally, Scotland’s Ross Muir became the final player to make it onto the tour today, with a resounding victory against Irish former pro David Morris, who had previously hit five century breaks during the event this week. To read more about Ross, click here to read a previous interview with him over at Snooker Island.

Congratulations to all four players and good luck to the remaining hopefuls, who will now battle it out for the final four main tour places from this year’s Q School at the third and final event over the coming four days.

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Today saw the first event of the 2013 Q School come to a conclusion, as the first four tour places from the competition were won by Lee Page, Elliot Slessor, Hammad Miah and Alex Davies.

You can read more about their triumphs here at World Snooker, but what more do we know about the fab four?

Probably the player that I have seen the most of is Lee Page, who was most recently on the tour back in 2009/10, the final season before Barry Hearn’s takeover. With victories over the likes of talented Irish junior Josh Boileau and Gareth Greene, he will be hoping to fare better than back then, when he was able to win just one match on tour before his relegation.

Another former professional back on the circuit is Alex Davies, who was last on tour back in 2007/8 following his victory at the English Amateur Championship in 2003, when he became the youngest ever winner of that competition. Though he was to spend just a single season on the tour back then, he was able to record wins against current professionals Mark Davis, Michael White and Jimmy Robertson, while more recently he defeated Irish former pro David Morris on his way to Q School qualification.

Completely new to the tour meanwhile are Elliot Slessor and Hammad Miah, both names that I have seen on drawsheets in recent seasons, without managing to catch them live up until this point.

Hailing from the north east, Slessor has wins against Ryan Day and Craig Steadman to his name this season and is well regarded by his peers, while I was tipped off about Miah recently by fellow blogger @garyoncue, who I think I am right in saying practises at the same club as the tour’s newest professional.

No sooner are these four lads on the tour however, but the race for the next four spots gets underway tomorrow with the second event of this year’s Q School. Stay tuned at snookerorg for all of the latest scores…

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Following my post last week confirming the route onto the main tour for wannabe professionals for 2013/14, it is time for my annual ‘roll call’ post, to track how all of the tour places will be filled.

Click below for the latest breakdown and summary as to how the 133 will be made up…

Updated 12/05/2013

For a full explanation of how the tour places are allocated, please see my previous article here.

The players currently confirmed to be on the main tour are as follows:

The Top 64

These players finished inside the top 64 on the two year rankings and so will retain their place on the circuit as a result.

(End of season rankings as of 06/05/2013)

1 Mark Selby

2 Neil Robertson

3 Judd Trump

4 Shaun Murphy

5 Stephen Maguire

6 Stuart Bingham

7 Mark Allen

8 Ricky Walden

9 Barry Hawkins

10 Ding Junhui

11 John Higgins

12 Graeme Dott

13 Mark Davis

14 Matthew Stevens

15 Mark Williams

16 Ali Carter

——————————

17 Marco Fu

18 Robert Milkins

19 Ronnie O’Sullivan

20 Joe Perry

21 Stephen Lee

22 Andrew Higginson

23 Dominic Dale

24 Tom Ford

25 Martin Gould

26 Michael Holt

27 Ken Doherty

28 Marcus Campbell

29 Mark King

30 Peter Ebdon

31 Ryan Day

32 Liang Wenbo

——————————

33 Ben Woollaston

34 Michael White

35 Jack Lisowski

36 Fergal O’Brien

37 Xiao Guodong

38 Jamie Cope

39 Jamie Burnett

40 Jamie Jones

41 David Gilbert

42 Mark Joyce

43 Anthony Hamilton

44 Matt Selt

45 Rory McLeod

46 Nigel Bond

47 Yu Delu

48 Anthony McGill

——————————

49 Alan McManus

50 Dave Harold

51 Steve Davis

52 Jimmy Robertson

53 Alfie Burden

54 Liu Chuang

55 Jimmy White

56 Gerard Greene

57 Peter Lines

58 Stephen Hendry

59 Rod Lawler

60 Adam Duffy

61 James Wattana

62 Barry Pinches

63 Mike Dunn

64 Kurt Maflin

The Two Year Cards (33)

These players competed on the main tour in 2012/13 and will start the 2013/14 season on the second year of their two-year tour cards.

• Cao Yupeng
• Dechawat Poomjaeng
• Ian Burns
• Thepchaiya Un-Nooh
• Tian Pengfei
• Thanawat Tirapongpaiboon
• Luca Brecel
• Aditya Mehta
• Pankaj Advani
• Paul Davison
• Liam Highfield
• Zhang Anda
• Chen Zhe
• Robbie Williams
• Michael Wasley
• Sam Baird
• Tony Drago
• Craig Steadman
• Li Yan
• Simon Bedford
• Martin O’Donnell
• Daniel Wells
• David Grace
• Scott Donaldson
• Joel Walker
• Sean O’Sullivan
• Passakorn Suwannawat
• Jamie O’Neill
• Michael Leslie
• Ben Judge
• Mohamed Khairy
• Hossein Vafaei Ayouri
• Floyd Ziegler

The PTC 8 (Top Eight on the PTC Order of Merit, Not Already On Tour)

These are the top eight players on the 2012/13 PTC Order of Merit, not already on the tour via the two year points list

1. Joe Swail
   
2. Andrew Pagett
   
3. Gary Wilson
   
4. Andrew Norman
5. John Astley
   
6. Allan Taylor
   
7. Kyren Wilson
   
8. Chris Norbury

The Q School (12)

Then a further 12 will be promoted from the Q School and these are as follows:

- Elliot Slessor (2013 Q School Event One semi-finalist)

- Alex Davies (2013 Q School Event One semi-finalist)

- Lee Page (2013 Q School Event One semi-finalist)

- Hammad Miah (2013 Q School Event One semi-finalist)

- Ryan Clark (2013 Q School Event Two semi-finalist)

- Alexander Ursenbacher (2013 Q School Event Two semi-finalist)

- Ahmed Saif (2013 Q School Event Two semi-finalist)

- Ross Muir (2013 Q School Event Two semi-finalist)

- ? (2013 Q School Event Three semi-finalist)

- ? (2013 Q School Event Three semi-finalist)

- ? (2013 Q School Event Three semi-finalist)

- ? (2013 Q School Event Three semi-finalist)

EBSA Play-Offs (3)

Three more qualified via the EBSA Play-Offs:

1. Jak Jones
2. Stuart Carrington
3. Patrick Einsle

APTC Order of Merit (4)

The four APTC qualifiers are:

1. Li Hang
2. Jin Long
3. Two from: Shi Hanqing, Cao Xinlong, Mei Xiwen (all finished level)

International Nominations (9)

The remaining players come from a mix of other amateur/international competitions . At present that looks to be shaping up as follows:

- Muhammed Asif (2012 IBSF World Champion)

- Lyu Haotian (2012 IBSF World Under 21 Champion)

- ? (2013 European Champion)

- James Cahill (2013 European U-21 Champion)

- Saleh Mohammed (2013 Asian Champion)

- Noppon Saengkham (2013 Asian U-21 Champion)

- Igor Figueiredo (Americas Nomination) – source

- Vinnie Calabrese? (Oceania Nomination) – source

- ? (Africa Nomination)

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Earlier this week, World Snooker issued extensive information concerning the main tour in 2013/14, as well as players packs for the first four ranking events of the new season.

Click below for a summary of what I believe to be the key points of interest from the documentation available…

• Click here to view links to the information available

Tour Information 2013/14

The key points to note for me are as follows:

2013/14

• Confirmation that the tour will be made up of a maximum of 133 players (breakdown here)
• The provisional calendar for 2013/14 has been updated to reflect the new Champion of Champions event and also to confirm the venue of the ET6 event in November 2013 as the South West Snooker Academy, Gloucester.
• The ranking points tariffs for 2013/14 have also been set. Confirmed are the tweaks to the formats for the three events that will not be staged under a flat draw, as well as the points available for the remaining events, with totals remaining unchanged for all events from the last 32 stage onwards.
• World Snooker have also confirmed the dates of the various seeding revisions, together with the details of which points will be removed at each cut-off, which is a notable improvement upon last season when such information was not published until much later.
• The 2013 Q School Order of Merit will be used to select amateur players to ‘top up’ events to a maximum of 128 players, should fewer than 128 professionals choose to enter any event.
• There will continue to be three rolling 147 prizes in operation, one for the final stages of major ranking events (£5,000), one for the qualifying stages of major ranking events (£500), and one for the last 128 stage of PTC events (£500).

One sentence in this section that has caused some confusion within the pack is as follows:

“Players who have joined the tour commencing the 2013/14 season will not receive starter points as they will receive a two year exemption from falling off the tour. Players who finished outside of the top 64 in the 2012/13 season but regain a tour place by any means will start on zero points.”

Following my posting of the latest projected seedings list yesterday, a number of people tweeted me to say that because of the above, everyone outside of the top 64 will start the season on zero points.

At present I have not received official confirmation on this point, but for me this would be a very strange rule and would surely defeat the object of awarding two-year tour cards to players in the first place.

My interpretation therefore is that those players who finished 2012/13 outside of the top 64, who have just completed the first year of their two-year tour cards, have not ‘regained’ their places for next season, because they had never actually lost them.

We shall no doubt see which interpretation is correct as time goes on. The wording is somewhat ambiguous, so I can understand the confusion caused by that sentence.

2014/15

• Tournaments from the start of 2014/15 will be seeded based on the prize money ranking list to be published following the 2014 World Championship
• Seeded losers in events to be played under the ‘old system’, eg where they not required to play from the first round, will receive ‘half-money’ towards their ranking total under the new money list.
• All players not in the top 64 of the the prize money ranking list after the 2014 World Championship, will be relegated from the main tour, unless they have a two-year card starting in 2013/14.

• In advance of the anticipated move to a money list for 2014/15, World Snooker have also published an ‘indicative prize money rankings schedule’ for the 2013/14 season, which answers the question of how World Snooker will deal with prize money in terms of exchange rates. Crucially, conversions have already been made for each event in pounds sterling, which will mean that the money list should hopefully be easier to understand for both players and fans alike.

Australian Goldfields Open entry pack

• All players who win a match will receive prize money (last year only the last 48 received prize money)
• The seedings for the tournament will be determined as follows:

1 – Defending champion

2 – World champion

3-97 – Next 95 tour players from 2013/14 official world ranking list

98-105 – Next 8 from 2012/13 PTC Order of Merit

106-109 – Next 4 from the 2012/13 PTC Order of Merit

110-133 – Remaining players at random

Should more than 128 players enter the event, a pre-qualifying round may be required, involving up to 10 first-year professionals selected at random.

There will be two wildcards in the competition

The entry deadline is Wednesday 15th May 2013 (12pm)

Wuxi Classic entry pack

• The seedings for the tournament will be determined as follows:

1 – Defending champion

2 – World champion

3-97 – Next 95 tour players from 2013/14 official world ranking list

98-133 – Remaining players selected at random

There will be four wildcards in the competition, who will play tour opponents selected from the 32 lowest seeded qualifiers. Any tour player selected for a wildcard match will be excluded for being selected for a wildcard match for any other event during the rest of the season

The entry deadline is Wednesday 15th May 2013 (12pm)

Bulgarian Open entry pack

• The event will consist of 128 players. If 128 or more main tour players enter, there will be no space for amateur entrants. If fewer than 128 main tour players enter, the remaining spaces will be filled by amateur entrants following a pre-qualifying event prior to the main event.
• The top 24 players on the European Tour Prize Money Order of Merit will qualify for the PTC Grand Finals
• Again, the top 8 players taken from the European Tour Order of Merit, who have not already qualified, will be awarded a place on the 2014/15 main tour.
• Eurosport will broadcast one match table from the last 128 stage
• The entry deadline is Thursday 16th May 2013 (12pm)

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A couple of days ago, I outlined the route on to the main tour for 2013/14 for wannabe snooker professionals and over the course of the next two weeks, we will learn the identity of another 12 of the total 133 as the 2013 Q School is played out at the EIS.

As ever, you can find all of the important links over on the sidebar to the right, with the ever reliable Snooker.org the place to go for all of the latest results. You can view the draw and follow the latest results from the first event here, with matches be played between 11-14 May 2013, while you can follow the latest livescores here at World Snooker.

Good luck to all involved in this year’s competition.

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With confirmation now received from World Snooker as to which ranking points will be removed at each upcoming seedings revision, as part of the recently published player’s letter (click here), I have now been able to prepare the first draft of the new projected seedings list for the start of 2013/14.

Click below for more information…

• Click here to view the new latest projected seedings list
• Click here to view the end of season rankings for 2012/13
• Click here to view the ranking points tariffs for 2013/14
• Click here to view the points that each player will be defending at the first cut-off
• Click here to view my explanation of how the current ranking system operates in snooker (updated for 2013/14)

What does this list show?

This list will be used to illustrate the very latest position, for when the seedings are revised for the first time this season following the European Tour 2 event on 22nd July 2013.

The list includes:

• The first five events of the 2013/14 season
• All points earned during the 2012/13 season
• All points earned during 2011/12 season, except the 2011 PTC1 and 2011 Australian Goldfields Open, which will no longer count following this season’s first seedings revision

But we now have flat draws, does this still matter?

Yes – the seeding list following the first mid-season revision will be used to determine the seedings for the 2013 Shanghai Masters. This event will be played under the ‘old’ system, with the battles for the top 16, top 32, top 64 and even the top 96 now important, when the seedings are determined.

To be confirmed

Readers will note that I have made certain assumptions, eg in terms of the minimum points that I have allocated to players for the Wuxi Classic and in particular the Australian Goldfields Open.

At the time of writing, I have made the assumption that every player with the exception of Stephen Hendry will enter both events, however it is inevitable that this will not be the case and therefore some of these totals will alter following the publication of the entry lists for both events. This list is purely intended as a guide at this stage.

Also to be confirmed are the identities of all of the new tour players in full and again this will be updated in due course.

If you do spot any obvious mistakes or omissions, please do contact me at prosnookerblog@gmail.com, or on Twitter @prosnookerblog.

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With the 2012/13 season now at an end, attention turns to the new campaign as the 2013 Q School gets underway this Saturday, with 12 more tour spots up for grabs.

But what about the other places? It had previously been announced that the tour would increase to 128 players for the new season, but I can now confirm that it will in fact rise to 133, click below for all of the details…

The Top 64 (64)

As has traditionally been the case, the top 64 in the official two-year ranking list at the end of the 2012/13 season will automatically retain their main tour place for the following campaign.

Including Rod Lawler and Kurt Maflin, who started the season on zero points, the big loser would appear to be Andy Hicks, who not on a two-year card for this season, has now finished outside of the top 64 and looks set to be relegated from the tour.

You can view the final two-year rankings here.

Again, players qualifying via this route will receive a one-year tour card for 2013/14 only.

The ‘Second Years’ (33)

Remember last season that everybody who gained or regained a tour card for 2012/13, who began outside of the top 64, was awarded a two-year tour card?

This means that everybody from 66th placed Cao Yupeng, down to 98th placed Floyd Ziegler, will remain on the main tour for 2013/14, on the second year of that two-year card.

The Top Eight (PTC Order of Merit) (8)

Joe Swail – Back on Tour

As was the case in 2011/12, the top eight performers on this season’s PTC Order of Merit, not already qualified for next season (eg inside the top 64 on the two-year list or already on a two-year card), will earn a tour card.

In practical terms, with nobody other than Andy Hicks dropping off the tour at the end of this season, that means that the top eight amateur players on this season’s PTC Order of Merit, will graduate to the main tour for 2013/14.

There players have been confirmed as follows:

1. Joe Swail (8,600)
2. Andrew Pagett (4,000)
3. Gary Wilson (4,000)
4. Andrew Norman (3,950)
5. John Astley (3,850)
6. Allan Taylor (3,850)
7. Kyren Wilson (2,500)
8. Chris Norbury (2,250)

These players will receive a two-year tour card.

Q School (12)

As was the case last season, twelve places will go to the Q School, which will see three tournaments staged in quick succession with the semi-finalists of each earning a place on the main tour for next season.

These players will receive a two-year tour card.

EBSA Play-Offs (3)

As concluded during the recent World Championship, the inaugural EBSA play-offs saw twelve players battle it out at the EISS, for three two-year tour cards beginning next season.

The successful qualifiers were:

1. Jak Jones
2. Stuart Carrington
3. Patrick Einsle

These players will receive a two-year tour card.

APTC Order of Merit (4)

Also new for this season, four places will go to the top four players on the new APTC Order of Merit, to players not already qualified for the main tour via other means.

The top four are:

1. Li Hang
2. Jin Long
3. Shi Hanqing, Cao Xinlong, Mei Xiwen (all finished level on 2,200, two will qualify)

These players will receive a two-year tour card.

International Nominations (9)

That leaves 9 places up for grabs, all of which will be made up of international nominations, assuming that they all choose to accept their nominations.

IBSF:

• 2012 IBSF World Champion - Muhammad Asif
• 2012 IBSF World Under-21 Champion - Lyu Haotian

ACBS:

• 2013 Asian Champion – Saleh Mohammed
• 2013 Asian U-21 Champion – Noppon Saengkham

EBSA:

• 2013 European Champion
• 2013 European U-21 Champion - James Cahill
  

Americas:

• One nomination (Brazil for 2012/13) – Igor Figueiredo

Oceania:

• One nomination

Africa:

• One nomination

These players will receive a two-year tour card.

With the final places to be decided over the coming weeks, stay tuned here at PSB for more updates on those tournaments…

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So as the curtain closes on another memorable 17 days in Sheffield, it is time for me to say thanks to all of the people who helped to make this year’s World Championship to be such a fun experience for me personally.

As I have said on many occasions, as a fan and as a blogger, my annual pilgrimage to the Crucible Theatre is about far more than just the snooker these days and is very much the highlight of my year.

Apologies to anyone reading who was not at the Crucible (indeed you can probably stop reading now), as well as those who I will inevitably forget to mention here…

It is something of a cliché and yet something that is probably impossible to fully appreciate unless you are at the heart of it, but when at the World Championship for any length of time, never mind the duration as I was in this year, you are very much at the epicentre of what we have now come to regard as the ‘snooker bubble.’

While everyday life of course goes on around you, with people walking around the city centre who have no interest in the snooker, or even knowledge that the tournament is going on, while at the Crucible you do come to recognise the same familiar faces, who return year after year, for session after session. Indeed it is easy to lose sight of what is going on in the outside world at times. 17 days is a long time, longer than an Olympic Games, while the staging of the qualifiers almost immediately beforehand effectively extends the length of the tournament to a month for those of us attending both events.

For me that is far from a bad thing, I love the feeling of the ‘snooker village’, that returned to the Crucible after last year’s rain afflicted tournament put something of a dampener on the atmosphere in 2012. It is always fun to be able to strike up a conversation with almost anyone around the venue, knowing that we are all there for the same reason – snooker.

Perhaps nowhere though is the sense of the snooker bubble more profound, than in the Crucible media room, where I was again fortunate to be able to spend much of this year’s tournament. My third year in there, second for the duration, it was for me by far my most enjoyable so far, as I got to catch-up with all of the familiar faces, as well as some new ones and knew what to expect, having been there before. The banter was as ever, top drawer and I was very much made to feel accepted by a great bunch of people there.

In no particular order, thanks then to Ivan from World Snooker for letting me loose in there for another year, as well as Hector Nunns, Jamie Broughton, Philip Studd, Rob Walker, Johnny Bryan, Ivan Speck, John Skilbeck, Neil Goulding, Charlie Talbot-Smith, Andy Dillon, Monique Limbos, Janie Watkins, Mark Rawlinson, Lauris Bērziņš and anyone else that I have omitted from my list.

As well as regulars Monique and Lauris, who are from Belgium and Latvia respectively, it was also a pleasure to meet a number of others who had come from overseas to cover the sport. In particular, Mike Fieldhammer had travelled from the USA to sample the atmosphere, while Italy’s Andrea Campagna had come from Italy and it was hard not to smile at the passion with which they both spoke about the game, despite being from countries that you would not associate with snooker.

One country that is known for its interest in snooker of course is China, however it is probably fair to say that having spent time with the excellent Nerissa Wang from my147.com this week, that only now do I appreciate quite how big snooker is over there. As well as Victoria, who is a familiar face in media centres on the snooker circuit, Nerissa does an excellent job for snooker in China and was also clearly enjoying her first trip to England.

As I say however, while I have been fortunate enough to spend time in the media centre, I am of course a fan at heart and have got to know a number of other Crucible regulars over the years with whom it was good to catch up with as always. Though I only see some of them once a year, it is always as if we had seen each other the day before and I look forward to seeing you again. In particular, Chris, Kellie, Maruta, Dan and all of the other regulars, always help to make the two weeks what it is.

A big thanks also to fellow blogger Roland from Snooker Island for helping to stop me from eating at McDonalds every day, as well as GaryOnCue who also came down for a few days in the second week and helped to raise the blogger count at the Crucible.

Furthermore, thanks to all of the players, their managers and the referees who have taken the time to chat this week, as well as the unsung heroes in the tournament office such as Mike Ganley and Martin Clark, without whom the tournament would not be the well-oiled machine that it very much is these days.

No doubt there are others whom I have carelessly forgotten (particularly those who I saw during the first week, which already feels like a distance memory), you all know who you are.

347 days until we get to do it all again…

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Congratulations to Ronnie O’Sullivan, who has defeated Barry Hawkins 18-12 to win the 2013 Betfair World Championship at the Crucible Theatre this evening. His fifth title of all, the victory sees O’Sullivan become the first man to successfully defend this title since Stephen Hendry back in 1996, as well as see him take home the top prize of £250,000.

• Click here to view the final drawsheet
• Click here to view the final end of season rankings

While many expected the final of the 2013 World Championship to be something of a procession, in reality it proved to be anything but, as Australian Goldfields Open champion Barry Hawkins took the fight to Ronnie O’Sullivan to trail just 10-7 overnight

During the opening day of the final, perhaps for the first time during the tournament, Ronnie had been placed under pressure, Barry winning three frames in a row to lead 3-2, while later winning two frames in a row during the evening session to draw level at 7-7. Ronnie’s response on both occasions was to be telling, back to back century breaks showing exactly what he could do when asked a question, in the biggest possible way.

In a way, this theme was to continue during today’s afternoon session, as though Barry continued to fight hard and impress everybody watching, Ronnie was to steal two crucial frames from behind, which would ultimately prove crucial.

The first came in the 20th frame, as having been very unfortunate to ‘fluke’ a red when he looked to be in control of a prolonged safety battle, O’Sullivan could only watch as Hawkins looked like reducing the gap to 11-9. A miss on a difficult frame ball red however, paved the way for an audacious clearance from Ronnie, which saw him move four clear for the first time in the match at 12-8.

To his credit, Hawkins as he had done throughout the match, replied with a brilliant break of 90 to ensure that the first four frames of the day were shared, however breaks of 133 and 124 from O’Sullivan, together with another steal from behind in frame 23, ensured that Ronnie would finish the third session five clear at 15-10.

As the evening session approached, many wondered whether it would prove to be an easy run to the line for Ronnie, indeed only four times previously had the player leading going into the final session of the World Championship final ended up as the loser.

If so, nobody had told Barry, who came out of the blocks with a brilliant break of 127, before adding the next with 66 to close the gap to 15-12 and ensure that the match would go into a final mid-session interval.

Unfortunately for Barry however, a missed red in the next would prove to be the final turning point of this match, a nerveless 77 from O’Sullivan seeing him stop the rot, before he added the next two frames to complete a remarkable 18-12 triumph and clinch his fifth world title.

More thoughts will following over the coming days as the dust settles, while Ronnie’s quotes will also follow later this evening, but it goes without saying that this is a remarkable triumph for O’Sullivan, who having had (with the exception of that PTC defeat to Simon Bedford late last year), a year away from the sport, has once again made winning snooker’s greatest prize, look almost easy.

As Ronnie explained during his press conferences this tournament, this year was a very different triumph to that back in 2012, when he felt like he was playing so well that nobody could stop him. This time, having not played competitively for all that time, his safety game might not have been quite as fine tuned as a year ago and his long game might not have been as strong as 2012, but his mental strength, his experience and his determination proved more than enough to get him through.

Indeed not just get him through, but no player was able to get within five frames of him during the tournament, which in itself is a scary fact. The subject of whether or not he will play again next season is one that will be hotly debated in the weeks and months to come, but for now let us just concentrate on his latest victory and reflect upon a sporting achievement of some significance.

UPDATE: Selected quotes from Ronnie:

“I thought that it was a brilliant final to be fair. Apart from a bit of last night where we were both a bit ropey, I thought that the snooker was really good.”

“I want to congratulate Barry on another great tournament, a brilliant season. I always knew that he had the talent, the game and he’s got the game to do well at a tournament like this, a bit like [Judd] Trump in many ways. He looks like he could do another World Championship to me, he looks as fresh as a daisy and he is a very efficient player and he put me under a lot of pressure this afternoon, I had to pull some really big clearances out of the bag.

“Tonight he came out all guns blazing and then he missed a couple and I had to make them count because if I didn’t, he could have got back to 15-14 and then you just don’t know what is going to happen.”

On where he would rank this latest title:

“I think the first one for me was always a big one to get over because everyone said that I was the best player not to win the World Championship, that was a massive relief. The other two I just kinda won, I didn’t feel much, I was in a place where I was over-analysing, criticising too much to maybe enjoy it.”

“Last year I came not so much with a point to prove, but having had two lean years, due to various reasons off the table and you hear people writing you off, I worked hard last year with Steve Peters and played in a lot of events. I never came here expecting to win it, but once I had passed my first round I really felt every moment, I felt present with everything, I felt every up, every down and I kinda managed my mind better than I had ever done and I played at times felt the best snooker I had ever played.”

“This year, pretty similar, there were times when parts of my game weren’t great, my long game was off sometimes, my scoring wasn’t great all the time and my safety wasn’t as good as it probably was last year, probably because I haven’t played in as many events, or in any events and you kinda lose that ringcraft, but I managed to play my way through the tournament and got stronger and stronger.”

“I think just my experience and having worked with Steve Peters, I was able to manage my emotions and my mind better than I ever have done which got me through, but at no stage did I feel like I could relax and had it won because you just don’t here. Other tournaments you do, but here it just seems to go on forever and ever and ever so you have to face your demons during this tournament and that’s why it is such a hard tournament to win.

“In some ways it is meant to be the easiest over longer frames, but during that match there were times when I was thinking that you kinda have a different respect for people like Steve Davis, Stephen Hendry now that they have won it six times and to keep having to go through that.”

“To be fair I had everything to lose and nothing to gain in some respects and that was hard. I was reading people saying like it was a procession and I know how good Barry is. To the outside world it looked like I should never lose but everyone on the snooker circuit including myself know what a good player Barry is and he is producing brilliant snooker here these last couple of weeks along with people like Stuart Bingham, they are playing some fantastic stuff.”

“One good thing this tournament has done, it has got me a wildcard into the Masters, everyone has to come in at round one so I don’t think that this is going to affect the rankings so much, but come the season after when it goes to prize money I think it puts me back up there, I haven’t got the mountain to climb that I had last year so in many respects to come here it has given me that chance to rebuild if I want to.”

“But like I said, I still want to just play in these smaller events. I like just playing and there is a lot of pressure and lot of attention here and sometimes, it’s hard. But I intend to play in some smaller events, I intend to keep on playing for the love of the game.”

“I had my year out, I enjoyed my year out, you just don’t know what is going to happen, the game is always changing. I intend to play in some smaller events. Come December, January I’ll have a better idea of what I am going to be doing, whether my heart is in it, but I think for me now it is just to enjoy the moment, enjoy having pulled off one of the most amazing things I have ever done in my life, retaining the world championship.”

“It hasn’t really sunk in, when I won my first one I was elated and last year I was elated. Here, I just feel like I have done a job in many respects. It will probably sink in in two or three days time but for me it has just been a dream, when I entered the tournament and done a press conference, for me to win it would have been a dream. It’s Harry Potter stuff isn’t it.”

“I’ve played some unbelievable players in the past and Stephen Hendry for me is still by far the greatest player, not just for his game, but for his bottle, the attitude, the way he played the game. Me, and Phil Yates, we grew up on the circuit together and that man was just awesome.”

“He took shots on that Judd Trump takes on, but he took them with getting on the black, Trump screws back to baulk, but he [Hendry] rolled them in for the black. To me that stands him out as the greatest player of all time. To me there will never be another Stephen Hendry, he was just awesome, he was the equivalent of Phil Taylor, Tiger Woods or Michael Schumacher. They only come around once every…every sport has one, but I think he was snooker’s.”

“I’m probably more in the mould of an Alex Higgins if you like but I just managed to win a few more titles and I probably had a lot more scoring power than Alex which has enabled me to do that, but we are too temperamental to be machines. I’m not a machine, I don’t intend to ever be a machine. I’ve tried to become more of a machine but it’ s hard when you are not a machine. But I’m working on it, I’m trying not to come here and spill my guts out and I’ve done that quite well for the last two years, but I am such an honest guy at times I just can’t help it and I’ve said that I just don’t think I can do this and I truly mean that, that’s how I genuinely feel.”

“But like Davis said, I’m up and down like whore’s drawers and I do change like the British weather, but it can be challenging for me at times. I’ve got my little place in history, but maybe that will be alongside the likes of Alex Higgins I would imagine.”

For all of the praise that will rightly be lavished upon O’Sullivan in the coming days however, let it not be forgotten the part played by Barry Hawkins during one of the best finals in recent years. As Monique Limbos in the media centre observed this evening, when people look at the history books in the years to come and see that Ronnie won 18-12, they may think that the victory was an easy one, but that would not do justice to what was an excellent performance from his unfancied opponent.

Indeed I genuinely believe that had Hawkins been playing anybody else on the tour during the final, then he could well have been the one holding up the trophy this evening, he played that well during all four sessions. There were times during the match when lesser players could easily have buckled, for example as he trailed 0-2, 5-7, 11-8 and 15-10, but he never let his head drop and he continued to fight until the very end.

I hope that Barry will be able to push on from here next season, there is no reason to think that he will not and that he cannot add further ranking event triumphs to his Australian Goldfields Open victory earlier this season. Congratulations to Barry, to his family, to his manager Paul Mount and to coach Terry Griffiths for all of their efforts here this week, which have captured the hearts of many watching.

My thoughts on the tournament and of my experience will follow, probably tomorrow, but in short it has been another thoroughly enjoyable 17 days, as always here at the Crucible. There have been better World Championships here in the past without doubt, but each is memorable for its own reasons and this one will be remembered for Ronnie’s return, as he proved his class on the big stage once again.

And the good news is that from this Saturday, it all kicks off again with the Q School, as snooker’s finest amateur’s look to earn a place on the main tour for the 2013/14 season.

Thank you to everyone that has read this blog or followed my updates on Twitter during the past couple of weeks, it is as appreciated as always.