2010 World Snooker Championship

(pictured) in Sheffield, England. The inaugural 1927 World Snooker Championship, then known as the Professional Championship of Snooker, took place at various venues in England between November 1926 and May 1927. Joe Davis won the final—held at Camkin's Hall in Birmingham from 9 to 12 May 1927—and went on to win the tournament 15 consecutive times before retiring undefeated after the 1946 edition (no tournaments were held from 1941 to 1945 because of World War II). The tournament went into abeyance after only two players contested the 1952 edition, due to a dispute between the Professional Billiards Players' Association (PBPA) and the Billiards Association and Control Council (BACC). The PBPA established an alternative tournament, the World Professional Championship, of which the six editions held between 1952 and 1957 are retroactively regarded as legitimate continuations of the World Snooker Championship. However, due to waning public interest in snooker during the era, that tournament was also discontinued, and the world title was uncontested between 1958 and 1963. The 1977 edition was the first staged at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, where it has remained since. The most successful players in the modern era was Stephen Hendry, having won the title seven times. Hendry was also the tournament's youngest winner, having captured his first title at the 1990 event, aged . Ray Reardon became the oldest winner when he secured his sixth title at the 1978 event, aged . The 2010 event was organised by the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association. John Higgins was the defending champion, having defeated Shaun Murphy 18–9 in the previous year's final. The event was sponsored by sports betting company Betfred, who extended their sponsorship of the event for a further four years. Format The 2010 World Snooker Championship took place from 17 April to 3 May 2010 in Sheffield, England. The tournament was the last of six ranking events in the 2009–10 snooker season on the World Snooker Tour. It featured a 32-player main draw that was held at the Crucible Theatre, as well as a qualifying draw that was played at the World Snooker Academy in Sheffield from 26 February to 9 March. The main stages of the event were broadcast by the BBC in the United Kingdom. The top 16 players in the latest world rankings automatically qualified for the main draw as seeded players. Higgins was seeded first overall as the defending champion, and the remaining 15 seeds were allocated based on the latest world rankings. All 16 non-seeded spots in the main draw were filled with players from the qualifying rounds. The draw for the televised stage of the World Championship was made on 11 March 2010. Prize fund The breakdown of prize money for the event is shown below: • Winner: £250,000 • Runner-up: £125,000 • Semi-final: £52,000 • Quarter-final: £24,050 • Last 16: £16,000 • Last 32: £12,000 • Last 48: £8,200 • Last 64: £4,600 • Stage one highest break: £1,000 • Stage two highest break: £10,000 • Stage one maximum break: £5,000 • Stage two maximum break: £147,000 • Total: £1,111,000 ==Summary==

First round The first round was played between 17 and 22 April as the best of 19 held over two . The defending champion, John Higgins, trailed Barry Hawkins 45 at the end of the first session, but he went on to secure his progress into the second round with of 63, 121, 67 and 114 for a 106 victory. "I was a total bag of nerves early on. I knew it was going to happen because that's how I felt on the two previous occasions I've come back here as the champion," Higgins said afterwards. An 18-year-old Zhang met Stephen Hendry, who built a 40 lead at the start of the match. Four of the sixteen seeded players lost their first-round matches: Marco Fu, Mark King, Peter Ebdon and Ryan Day. Martin Gould trailed Fu 68 despite recording two centuries, but he forced a decider and took it with a 90 break. Steve Davis won four frames in a row to go 86 ahead and clinched victory in the decider. Ebdon, the 2002 champion, faced Graeme Dott, who had defeated him in the 2006 final. Dott won 105, leaving Ebdon out of the top 16 for the following season for the first time since 1994. Mark Davis ended the first session ahead at 54 and won the second by the same score to seal a 108 victory. "It was a struggle. I'm over the moon with the result but not the performance. The first round is a twitchy one," Williams admitted after the win. and 93, only one away from victory, but Liang compiled breaks of 61, 103 and 127 to win four frames on the trot and reduce the deficit. The match featured a frame that lasted 69 minutes, with the players taking 20 minutes to pot the yellow when only the remained on the table. Greene reduced the deficit from 29 to 79, making breaks of 67, 65 and 92 in the process. "I think I've under-achieved in my career so far, but I'm trying different things to try to win more tournaments," Maguire stated. Higgins had a chance to level the scores at 12-all and force a decider, but he missed a pot. With only four colours remaining on the table, Steve Davis potted the with a and later on secured victory with and pink. Days later, ahead of the start of the final of the tournament, it was announced that Higgins had been suspended by the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association following a News of the World story alleging that he had agreed to lose frames in future tournaments in return for £261,000. Mark Davis was playing in the second round of the World Championship only for the second time: he had succumbed to Ebdon in 1995. He lost position and had to play the pink instead of the black, which allowed him to record the first 146 break in the history of the Crucible. Maguire took five of the following six frames, but Dott produced a 49 break to win 136. Robertson produced breaks of 64 and 112 as he forced a deciding frame. Carter then compiled breaks of 104 and 82 and wrapped up victory in the next frame with a 1311 result. The opening frame of the match, in which Davis's pace was regarded by Clive Everton as "funereal", lasted half an hour. In the second, Davis made a 128 break, but Robertson had the chance to win the match. "I feel 10 years younger. I've had such great receptions from the crowd, I've thoroughly enjoyed myself and I didn't want it to stop. I've climbed a mountain to reach the quarter-final," Davis said afterwards. In the opening frame, which lasted 42 minutes, O'Sullivan got a snooker that allowed him to extract 24 penalty points from his opponent. O'Sullivan managed to edge closer at 79 and 911, but Selby clinched victory with a 1311 result. Carter recorded a 122 break to go ahead at the resumption, but Murphy was in front at 1211. Clive Everton wrote that Carter had needed a "prodigious mental effort" to win the decider against Murphy in the quarter-finals. Carter then replied with breaks of 76 and 81 to halve the deficit, but Robertson recovered with runs of 59 and 104 for a 106 at the end of the session. Carter edged closer at 1216, but Robertson won the match 1712. In the last session, Selby made breaks of 79 and 83 as he won the first three frames. After a passage of play that was monopolized by safety play, Dott replied with a 67 break. It marked the first sime since 2003 that no English player appeared in the final. Referee Eirian Williams officiated the match, the fourth time he was in charge of a world final after 2001, 2005 and 2007. Dott began the final with a break of 80 and led 31. It was taking both players longer than usual to play each shot. Robertson made two breaks of 55 and another one of 53 The final ended at 12:54 a.m., exactly as late as the 2007 final, which held the record for the latest finish. He also became the first player from outside the United Kingdom and Ireland to win the title since Canada's Cliff Thorburn in 1980 and the first non-British player to win the title since Ireland's Ken Doherty in 1997. Robertson hoped his win would help lift the low profile of snooker in his home country. "It would have been a big blow if I had lost in the final. I had all that pressure to contend with but hopefully this is the start of something and we can have an event there now," Robertson said. ==Main draw==

Shown below are the results for each round. The numbers in parentheses beside some of the players are their seeding ranks (each championship has 16 seeds and 16 qualifiers). ==Qualification==

Preliminary qualifying The preliminary qualifying rounds for the tournament took place on 26 February 2010 at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield. (WPBSA members not on The Tour.) Round 1 Round 2 Qualifying The first four qualifying rounds for the tournament took place between 27 February and 5 March at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield. The final round took place between 7 and 9 March at the same venue. Round 1 Rounds 2–5 ==Century breaks ==

Televised stage centuries There were 60 centuries in the televised stage of the World Championship. • 146, 131, 122, 101, 100 Mark Allen • 146, 130, 127, 116, 115, 112, 110, 105 Graeme Dott • 142, 117, 108, 106, 104, 103 Mark Selby • 140, 124, 116, 112, 107, 106, 104 Neil Robertson • 137, 120, 103 Ding Junhui • 128, 108, 100 Shaun Murphy • 128, 102 Steve Davis • 127, 103 Liang Wenbo • 127 Stephen Lee • 122, 104, 100 Ali Carter • 121, 115, 114, 106 John Higgins • 121 Stephen Hendry • 120, 114 Stephen Maguire • 117, 111, 108, 106, 104, 100 Ronnie O'Sullivan • 116, 103, 102 Martin Gould • 115 Mark Williams • 112 Michael Holt • 112 Marco Fu • 107 Tom Ford Qualifying stage centuries There were 50 century breaks in the qualifying stage of the World Championship. • 140 James Wattana • 139, 100 Mark Joyce • 138, 133, 121, 101 Bjorn Haneveer • 137, 104 Matthew Stevens • 137, 103 Jimmy White • 134, 114, 113, 103, 101 Zhang Anda • 134 David Gray • 133 Barry Hawkins • 132, 121 Rod Lawler • 132, 120, 100 Tom Ford • 131, 126, 105 Michael White • 131, 104 Chris Norbury • 129, 114 Martin Gould • 129 Nigel Bond • 128, 113, 104 Adrian Gunnell • 116, 103 Brendan O'Donoghue • 116, 100 Mark Davis • 115, 103 Craig Steadman • 108 Jamie Cope • 107 Tony Drago • 105 Joe Jogia • 104 Matthew Couch • 103 Sam Baird • 103 Anthony Hamilton • 102 Xiao Guodong • 101 Jimmy Robertson • 101 Alan McManus • 100 Li Hang == Notes ==