Neil Robertson ready to ‘clean up the mess from evil twin’ after Masters snooker exit

Neil Robertson says he is working to undo the work done by his “evil twin” in his last 18 months on the World Snooker Tour, and hopes a trip home to Australia has done his mental wellbeing some good.

With his one year ranking for the season down at 88, the 41-year-old faces the prospect of having to go through qualifying for the World Championship, which starts on April 20.

Robertson has struggled to make an impact on ranking events this season, suffering early exits at his last six such tournaments, including the UK Championship at the end of 2023. He also failed to win a major trophy last season for the first time since 2005.

He has spoken previously about being homesick, and took time off recently to return to Australia for an attempted “reset”.

“I don’t have many tournaments left [this season] and obviously missed a few taking a trip to Australia, but I made my bed with that, I knew there was a chance that I might have to qualify [for the World Championship],” Robertson told Eurosport.

“I’ve got to try and clean up the mess from my evil twin over the past 18 months who hasn’t been performing very well.

“My trip to Australia, that was the most important thing. If I had stayed here, I would have had absolutely no chance of taking anything from the season, but going back home for a few weeks was really good for my mental wellbeing.

“[It was my] first Christmas in 14 years in Australia, and the first time seeing my family other than my mum and dad for four and a half years. Getting to see all my nephews and stuff, getting home, it was really important.”

Eurosport expert Alan McManus agrees that Robertson’s trip home was the right thing to do, but questions some of the choices the Australian has made in the past year and a half – but he is backing him to return to the top of his game.

“Priority number one is his mental health,” McManus said.

“On the snooker side, there have been a lot of strange decisions in the last 18 months or so. He missed the first events of last season, from a snooker point of view – that was a mistake.

“He finds himself 88th in the one year list, and he’s got some problems to solve. He will solve them – it’ll take a while. He will come back, it’s just a question of when.”