The paradox of Ronnie O’Sullivan: The figurehead and rebel who put GOAT status beyond doubt in 2022

Ronnie O’Sullivan began 2022 as most people’s pick for snooker’s GOAT but with a nagging reason to dissent from this view: he had six world titles to his name while Stephen Hendry had won seven.

This was the real Ronnie: passionate, committed and emotional. The World Championship, with its prestige, profile and length of matches, is like no other event. It’s like climbing a succession of mountains, having to survive various rockfalls along the way.

Throughout the 17 days O’Sullivan’s focus was exemplary. There were no major slips on table or off it. Judd Trump came back at him on the final day but O’Sullivan recovered his composure in the concluding session.

Seventh heaven had been a long road. There was a time when some doubted, given the turmoil his life was in off table as a young man, whether he would even win one world title.

But O’Sullivan has proven to be snooker’s great survivor, coming back time and again from all manner of setbacks, controversies and his own love-hate feelings about the sport to dazzle us once more. This year, he cemented his place at the head of the pantheon.

The World Championship is snooker’s ultimate prize, far outstripping any other. It is a such a Holy Grail that players unsuccessful in Sheffield can end up being defined by coming up short, as Jimmy White will attest. Therefore, a Crucible win can make up for deficiencies elsewhere. It can also mask the true picture.

Between winning his sixth world title in 2020 and seventh in 2022 O’Sullivan played in 29 tournaments and won only one of them, last season’s World Grand Prix. The last event he captured played under the flat draw format in which every player comes in at the last 128 stage was the UK Championship four years ago.

So although O’Sullivan dominates the headlines, he is not actually dominating the sport. Nobody is, because the standard through the ranks is now so high that lower ranked players are more than capable not only of causing upsets but of winning titles. Fan Zhengyi, a completely unheralded player stationed 81st in the rankings, was the best example of this when he beat the Rocket in the European Masters final last February.

Where O’Sullivan can still be backed to come good is in an environment which feels special, in which his stature is amplified, hence he triumphed at the Hong Kong Masters this season, an elite event which attracted a record live audience of 9,000 people. He also won the Champion of Champions, another one-table, big money tournament designed for the best.

The everyday events which form the bread and butter of the circuit do not get his juices flowing as much after 30 years on tour, so in these he tends to be vulnerable.

It makes sense. If he put as much intensity into every event as he did the Crucible this year he would burn out. His strategy instead is to treat tournaments as mini-breaks, not putting too much pressure on himself. He checks out the route for his morning run, finds a local coffee shop and also plays a snooker match or two.

At this stage of his career, enjoying the experience of being at tournaments is as important as whether he wins them, although he is clearly still a competitive animal in the arena, often berating himself for mistakes and talking down what appear to mere mortals to be strong performances.

But when he gets knocked out he is usually gracious. In fact, most of his uncomfortable interviews come when he has won.

Some players feel O’Sullivan receives special treatment. In some ways they are right, but then again he is special. It’s always his face on the posters, his name in lights. He is used to sell a sport from which many others make a good living.

Snooker will ultimately survive without him, but it will miss him. It should count itself lucky that his popular brand of play and at times eccentric personality continues to bring in huge audiences. There is ample room for others to shine, and they do, but many fans still come to events first and foremost because of him.

So what does 2023 hold? O’Sullivan’s profile is set to grow further with the release of the Netflix documentary filmed last season, which includes his Crucible triumph.

It will bring him – and snooker – to new audiences, so promises to be a positive for the sport, although it will doubtless also touch on the aspects of the game that he dislikes.

The paradox of O’Sullivan is that he manages to be both a figurehead and a rebel at the same time, simultaneously putting snooker on the map and then scribbling over it. Yet the game still runs through his veins. The many retirement threats have come to nothing. He is 47 now but plays like a young man. There is no obvious decline. His eyesight is good and he keeps himself physically fit.

The truth is, through his own remarkable achievements O’Sullivan has reached the enviable position of having nothing left to prove. Any title he wins now is only adding to a formidable legacy of greatness.

The last question mark against him was removed in 2022. On snooker’s most revered stage, our sport’s great survivor outlasted them all, and proved beyond any reasonable doubt that he is the best there has ever been.

– – –