2013 World Snooker Championship


The 2013 World Snooker Championship was a professional snooker tournament that took place from 20 April to 6 May 2013 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. It was the 37th consecutive year that the World Snooker Championship had been held at the Crucible and was the last ranking event of the 2012–2013 snooker season. The event was sponsored by sports betting company Betfair for the first time.
Despite having played only one competitive match all season, defending champion Ronnie O'Sullivan did not lose a session in the tournament. He defeated Barry Hawkins 18–12 in the final to become a five-time World Champion, joining Steve Davis and Stephen Hendry as the only players ever to defend their titles successfully at the Crucible. He broke Hendry's record of 127 career Crucible centuries, finishing the tournament with 131. He also became the first player to make six century breaks in a World Championship final. A total of 55 century breaks were made during the event, with the highest, a 143 made by Neil Robertson in his first round loss to Robert Milkins.

Overview

The World Snooker Championship is an annual cue sport tournament and the official professional world championship of the game of snooker. Founded in the late 19th century by British Army soldiers stationed in India, the sport was played in the United Kingdom. In modern times, however, it has been played worldwide, especially in East and Southeast Asia nations such as China, Hong Kong and Thailand.
The world championship sees 32 professional players compete in one-on-one snooker matches in a single elimination format, each played over several. The event's 32 players are selected through a mix of the world snooker rankings, and a pre-tournament qualification round. The first world championship in 1927 was won by Joe Davis, the final being held in Camkin's Hall, Birmingham, England. Since 1977, the event has been held at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. Stephen Hendry is the most successful player in the modern era, having won the championship seven times. England's Ronnie O'Sullivan won the previous year's championship by defeating countryman Ali Carter in the final 18–11. The winner of the 2013 event earned prize money of £250,000, from a total pool of £1,111,000. The event was sponsored by sports betting company Betfair for the first time.

Format

The 2013 World Snooker Championship was held between 20 April and 6 May 2013 in Sheffield, England. The tournament was the last of 11 rankings events in the 2012-13 snooker season on the World Snooker Tour. It featured a 32-player main draw that took place at the Crucible Theatre, as well as a 92-player qualifying draw that was played at the 6 and 11 April 2015 at the English Institute of Sport. This was the 37th consecutive year that the tournament had been held at the Crucible, and it was the 45th successive world championship to be contested through the knockout format after reverting from a challenge match system in the 1960s.
The top 16 players in the latest world rankings automatically qualified for the main draw as seeded players. Ronnie O'Sullivan was seeded first overall as the defending champion, while the remaining 15 seeds were allocated based on the latest world rankings, released after the penultimate event of the season, the China Open. The number of frames needed to win a match increased with each proceeding round of the main draw, starting with best-of-19-frames matches in the first round, leading up to the final which was played as a best-of-35-frames match.

Prize fund

The event featured a prize fund of £1,111,000 with the winner receiving £250,000. A breakdown of prize money for this year is shown below:

First round

The first round was played between 20 and 25 April 2013 with matches held as the best-of-19 frames over two. Six players made their debut at the main stages of the event: Jack Lisowski, Michael White, Ben Woollaston, Dechawat Poomjaeng, Matthew Selt and Sam Baird. Poomjaeng was only the third player from Thailand, after James Wattana and Tai Pichit, to reach the event. Two of these progressed to the second round. Michael White advanced by defeating two-time champion Mark Williams 10–6, while Dechawat Poomjaeng advanced by beating Stephen Maguire 10–9.
After a record number of Chinese players – four – played in the 2012 event, Ding Junhui was his nation's only representative at the event. Ding defeated Alan McManus 10–5 to reach the second round. Peter Ebdon was playing in a 22nd consecutive World Championship, equalling the number of consecutive appearances made by Steve Davis. This put him third for consecutive appearances behind Stephen Hendry on 27 and O'Sullivan on 26. In a rematch of the final of the 2006 event, Ebdon faced Graeme Dott. The match was played over three sessions, as the match overran in length, with Dott ahead 8–6 after the second session, and eventually won 10–6. In total, the match was over seven hours in length, and Ebdon had a high of 37. Dott criticised Ebdon for his perceived slow play and called for a rule to limit the amount of time a player could spend over a shot.
The ending to the match between defending champion Ronnie O'Sullivan and Marcus Campbell was unaired on the BBC as it aired a repeat episode of the 1970s sitcom Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em. With the match also unavailable on the BBC Red Button service, viewers expressed their anger on social networks. The CEO of World Snooker, Barry Hearn, apologised to fans on Twitter and wrote a formal letter of complaint to the BBC. O'Sullivan later won the match 10–4. He had not played a single competitive match since winning the title the year prior. O'Sullivan said that he wanted to "take some time off", and had refused to sign the players contract for the following season.
The 2010 champion Neil Robertson was defeated by Robert Milkins, 8–10. Robertson made the highest break of the event, a 143 in frame six, and lead 5–2 but Milkins tied the match at 8–8 before winning the next to frames. In other matches, four-time champion John Higgins lost 6–10 to Mark Davis, whilst former finalist Matthew Stevens lost 7–10 to qualifier Marco Fu.

Second round

The second round was played between 25 and 30 April as the best-of-25 frames over three sessions. Shaun Murphy defeated Graeme Dott 13–11, after leading 6–2 after the first session. Dott's loss meant there were no Scottish players in the last eight for the first time since 1988. Michael White reached his first ranking event quarter-final by defeating Poomjaeng 13–3, after just two of the three scheduled sessions. In the fourth frame, Poomjaeng used the to bridge over the, but missed hitting a on three occasions, forfeiting the frame.
O'Sullivan became the first defending champion since Murphy in 2006 to reach the quarter-finals when he defeated Ali Carter, his opponent in the 2008 and 2012 World Championship finals, 13–8. Ricky Walden defeating Robert Milkins 13–11. Milkins trailed 3–9, but fought back to 10–11 and 11–12, before Walden won the frame he needed for victory. This was Walden's first world championship quarter-finl appearance. Barry Hawkins also reached his first Crucible quarter-final after defeating world number one Mark Selby 13–10.

Quarter-finals

The quarter-finals were played on 31 April and 1 May as the best-of-25 frames matches over three sessions. O'Sullivan faced Stuart Bingham, with O'Sullivan winning 11 of the first 12 frames. He later won the match in the first frame of the third session 13–4. Judd Trump trailed 3–8 behind against Shaun Murphy, but tied the score at 12–12 to force a. The final frame lasted 53 minutes, and was won by Trump. Ricky Walden defeat Welsh player Michael White 13–6 and Hawkins defeated China's Ding Junhui 13–7 to put the two remaining non-English competitors out of the tournament. Walden reached the semi finals of the World Championship on his third attempt, despite never having previously won a match in his only other two appearances at main stages of the event in both 2009 and 2011.

Semi-finals

The semi-finals were played between 2 and 4 May 2013 and were played over four sessions as the best-of-33 frames. This was only the third time in the modern history of snooker that all four semi-finalists were English. The other two times were when Joe Johnson played Neal Foulds and Jimmy White played Steve Davis in 1987 and when Steve James played White and John Parrott played Davis in 1991. O'Sullivan played Judd Trump in the first semi. In the 23rd frame, O'Sullivan received a reprimand from referee Michaela Tabb for allegedly making an obscene gesture with his cue. A World Snooker spokesman later stated that eyewitnesses had also observed O'Sullivan making an inappropriate gesture, although it was not captured on camera. O'Sullivan defeated Trump 17–11, and became the first defending champion to reach the final since Ken Doherty in 1998. In the other semi-final, Barry Hawkins trailed Ricky Walden 8–12, but won nine of the next eleven frames to win 17–14.

Final

The final was played between Ronnie O'Sullivan and Barry Hawkins between 5 and 6 May 2013. The match was played as the best-of-35 frames, held over four sessions and officiated by Jan Verhaas. O'Sullivan led the final 5–3 after the first session, and although Hawkins drew level at 7–7, O'Sullivan won the last three frames of the day to take a 10–7 overnight lead. O'Sullivan's break of 103 in the 15th frame was his 128th century break at the Crucible Theatre, breaking Stephen Hendry's record of 127 Crucible centuries. During the final he extended the record to 131 century breaks. O'Sullivan won the third session by five frames to three to lead by five at 15–10. O'Sullivan went on to win the final 18–12 to take his fifth world title. He became the first defending champion to retain his title since Hendry in 1996, and the first player to score six century breaks in a world championship final.
The final had a total of eight century breaks, which equalled the record set in the 2002 final between Hendry and Peter Ebdon. At the age of 37, O'Sullivan became the oldest World Snooker Champion since 45-year-old Ray Reardon in 1978. This was O'Sullivan's fifth world championship, but did not rule out a similar season away from the tour, saying "I had my year out and enjoyed my year out. I intend to play in some small events. Come December or January I'll have a better idea of what I'm going to do." As world champion, O'Sullivan was awarded a wild card place at the 2014 Masters, which he also won.

Main draw

Shown below are the results for each round. The numbers in parentheses beside some of the players are their seeding ranks. The draw for the first round took place on 15 April 2013, one day after the qualifying, and was broadcast live by Talksport at 1.30 pm BST.

Qualifying

Preliminary qualifying

Four preliminary qualifying rounds for the tournament were for invited amateur players members not on the Main Tour and took place on 4 and 5 April 2013 at the World Snooker Academy in Sheffield. Players in bold denote match winners.
Round 1
Round 2
Round 3
Round 4

Main qualifying

The qualifying rounds 1–3 for the tournament took place between 6 and 11 April 2013 at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield, England. The final round of qualifying took place between 13 and 14 April 2013 at the same venue.

Century breaks

Televised stage centuries

There were 55 century breaks in the televised stage of the World Championship. Neil Robertson, the player who compiled the highest break of the tournament, received a made of gold.
There were 63 century breaks in the qualifying stage of the World Championship: