The 2002 World Snooker Championship was a professional snooker tournament that took place from 20 April to 6 May 2002 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. It was the final ranking event of the 2002–03 snooker season. This was the 26th consecutive year that the World Snooker Championship had been held at the Crucible, marking the 25th anniversary of the first staging of the event at this venue. The championships were sponsored by cigarette manufacturer Embassy. Mark Williams won his second World Championship title by defeating Ken Doherty 18–16 in the final. Having won the UK Championship and the Masters earlier in the season, Williams held all three Triple Crown titles simultaneously. The defending champion, Peter Ebdon, lost 12–13 to Paul Hunter in the quarter-finals and became another first-time champion to fall to the Crucible curse by failing to defend his first world title. A total prize fund of £1,682,900 was awarded at the event, with the winner receiving £270,000.
The championship was held from 19 April and 5 May 2003 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England, the 26th consecutive time that the tournament was held at the venue. It was the ninth and last ranking event of the 2001–02 snooker season on the World Snooker Tour. There were a total of 120 entrants from the tour, and the competition's main draw had 32 participants. The top 16 players in the latest world rankings automatically qualified for the main draw as seeded players. As defending champion, Peter Ebdon was seeded first for the event; the remaining 15 seeds were allocated based on the payers' world ranking positions. Matches in the first round of the main draw were played as best-of-19-frames. The number of frames needed to win a match increased to 13 in the second round and quarter-finals, and 17 in the semi-finals; the final match was played as best-of-35-frames.
Prize fund
The breakdown of prize money for the event is shown below:
Winner: £270,000
Runner-up: £158,000
Semi-final: £79,000
Quarter-final: £39,500
Last 16: £22,000
Last 32: £15,000
Highest break: £22,000
Maximum break: £147,000
Total: £1,682,900
Tournament summary
Ronnie O'Sullivan compiled a maximum break in his first-round match against Marco Fu, making him the first player to have scored two 147s at the venue. This was only the fifth maximum compiled at the Crucible; there had not been another since O'Sullivan made the first 147 of his career at the 1997 World Championship. However, Fu won the match 10–6.
Stephen Hendry made a 132 break in his first round match against Gary Wilkinson, and became the first player to compile 100 century breaks at the Crucible.
During his second round match, Paul Hunter compiled the 750th century at the Crucible in frame four.
Mark Williams lost the opening two frames of his second-round match against Quinten Hann before winning 13 in a row – a record for a single match in modern times – to triumph 13–2.
In his quarter-final against John Higgins, Doherty won the first ten frames, before Higgins took the next seven. Doherty eventually won the match 13–8.
In the semi-finals, Ken Doherty trailed Paul Hunter 9–15 at the start of the final session, Hunter needing only two more frames for victory. Doherty won five in a row to reduce the deficit to one frame, but Hunter then took the 30th; however, Doherty won all three remaining frames to win the match 17–16 and reach the final.
Doherty produced a similar comeback in the final against Mark Williams, where he fell 2–10 behind before taking nine of the next ten frames to level at 11–11. He would also level the match at 12–12, 13–13, 14–14 and 16–16, before eventually losing the next two frames and the match.
Doherty played a total of 132 frames, a modern-day record at the World Championship.
Williams' victory in the final made him only the 3rd player in history to hold all three of snooker's Triple Crown events simultaneously, having also won the UK Championship and Masters tournaments earlier in the season.
Final
The final was held on 4 and 5 May between Ken Doherty and Mark Williams as a best-of-35 frames match. The final was officiated by Dutch referee Jan Verhaas. Williams took an early lead in the final, leading at 6-2 after the first session, and extended the lead to 10-2 in the second session. Doherty won three of the remaining four frame in the session to, with Williams leading 11-5 overnight. On the resumption in the third session, Doherty won six frames in-a-row to tie the match at 11-11. The pair shared the next six frames with the scores tied at 14-14, before Williams won the next two frames to lead 16-14. Doherty won the next two, before Williams won frame 33 and then frame 34 with a break of 77 to win the match 18-16. The win was Williams' second world championship, having won the title in 2000. In winning the event, Williams completed the Triple Crown, having also won the UK Championship and Masters in the season. He was only the third player to win these three events in a single season. The win allowed Williams to regain the position as world number one, the first player to regain the position.
Main draw
Shown below are the results for each round. The numbers in brackets represents players seeding, whilst those in bold denote match winners.
Century breaks
There were 53 century breaks made in the tournament. The highest break was a maximum break of 147 made by Ronnie O'Sullivan in the opening round.
