O'Sullivan on the British Championship: As long as I want to win the championship, it is very likely that no one can stop it except the Big Three and the Wizards.
The British Championship will be held from the 23rd of this month to the Kembark Center in the United Kingdom from december 4th, and the TOP16 including O'Sullivan, Trump, Selby, Robertson and Higgins will participate in the battle. The prize money for the tournament winner is £200,000. As a blessed land, Ding Junhui, who has been in a slump for a long time, also hopes to win the championship to sweep away the haze. The World Championships, British Championships and Masters are considered to be the three major snooker competitions, and players who win three championships can wear the small crown uniform issued by the World Taiwan Federation, also known as Grand Slam players.
In the history of the British Championships, O'Sullivan won seven titles, becoming the player with the most titles in the tournament. It was followed by Davis' 6 crowns and Hendry's 5 crowns. Ding Junhui has won three titles, and he has beaten Davis, Higgins and Maguire to reach the top in 2005, 2009 and 2019 respectively.
O'Sullivan, who reached the semi-finals at the just-concluded English Open, recently said in an interview with Eurosport that he was actively preparing for the British Championship. "As long as I want to play [win the championship], I can play [do it]," he says. ”
So far this season, O'Sullivan has competed in three races that have not been satisfactory. The Champions League entered the Champions League, but later withdrew for personal reasons; the Northern Ireland 1/8 final was killed by Yan Bingtao 3-4; the English Open semi-final 5-3 lead was reversed by old rival Higgins in three consecutive sets to reverse the final. Losing to Yan Bingtao, the decider O'Sullivan is obviously absent-minded on both the defensive and offensive ends, and the release of water is serious, if he attaches great importance to this game, as he said " as long as I want to win, no one can stop it ", of course, it is difficult to pose a threat to Yan Bingtao's competitive level. In the defeat to Higgins, O'Sullivan had two chances to end the game, but two simple balls that should not have been wrong made wrong, allowing the latter to punish him.
In short, O'Sullivan had the opportunity to rush to the championship in both races, but missed the opportunity because he "did not pay attention", not that he did not have the ability to win the championship.
In 1993, O'Sullivan defeated Hendry in the final of the British Championship at the age of 18 to create the youngest winner of the ranking tournament in snooker history, and was crowned six times, becoming the most won player in the tournament. Although he is currently 45 years old and has passed the peak of his career, as long as he wants to win, there are few top players who can stop him, except for the Big Three and Higgins. Robertson, who has just won the English Open, is the defending champion of the tournament, and last year he won the final tiebreaker with a brilliant pink ball to Trump.