Top 10 moments of 2022/23 snooker season: No. 6 – Robert Milkins hits jackpot at Welsh Open in biggest match of his life

After the conclusion of another extraordinary snooker season, we pick 10 memorable moments from the 2022/23 campaign as captured by the Eurosport cameras. You can vote for your personal favourite when we reveal our final list of contenders later this month.

No. 6 – Milkins hits jackpot at Welsh Open

For a character known as ‘The Milkman’, seemingly since time began, Llandudno was the land of milk and honey. Robert Milkins began the Welsh Open in the picturesque coastal town in February as an unfancied 125-1 outsider.

When the likeable Gloucester professional somehow burrowed his way to the final against Shaun Murphy, he remained a long shot in a two-horse race at 13/8 with his thoroughbred opponent the 4/9 odds-on favourite.

Defeat for Milkins was not only the likely outcome against the 2005 world champion performing close to his potting pedigree, but also financially punitive with a serious life-altering wedge of cash riding on one match through no fault of his own.

Like the old Noel Edmonds game show Deal or No Deal, Bob was faced with two boxes.

One with £35,000 for finishing runner-up, the other with £230,000 up front in a veritable snooker suitcase of green baize gold.

£80,000 for winning the Welsh Open and another £150,000 for carrying off the European Order of Merit Series bonus was worth the milking.

Failure to launch in the final would force Milkins to confront a whopping drop-off of £195,000.

Plus waving farewell to lucrative add-ons that included access to the elite Players Championship, Tour Championship, a spot at the World Championship and Champions of Champions later in the year.

There was no hiding place for Bob with £150,000 flying off to Ali ‘The Captain’ Carter in deepest Essex if he lost.

“It’s massive, the biggest game of my life. I don’t know how I’m going to cope,” Milkins said.

“It would be enough just playing for the title, let alone everything that goes with it.

“I don’t know if I’ll be able to stand up, but I might rise to the occasion.”

It is fair to say the cream rises to the top in professional sport when self-confidence is high.

He defeated Mark Selby (4-2), Hossein Vafaei (4-1), Mark Allen (5-1) and Tian Pengfei (6-2) before standing up to a gruelling test of his bottle against Murphy, who would later illustrate his rich form with commanding victories at the Players and Tour Championship.

Murphy gained a sense of atonement with a 10-8 win at the Tour Championship over Milkins, who had won the match that mattered in being forced to go all in.

He was priced at a generous 9/1 to achieve that scoreline.

MILKMAN IN THE MONEY

• Welsh Open – £80,000
• Players Championship quarter-finals – £15,000
• European Order of Merit Series bonus – £150,000
• Tour Championship quarter-finals – £20,000
• World Championship last 16 – £30,000
• Champion of Champions last 16 – £12,500

Milkins’ previous best earnings in a 28-year journeyman career saw him earn £139,000 in 2015.

Adding the £150,000 bonus saw him collect £380,600 from the days of his life as he finished the season 13th in the world rankings from a starting position of 37.

Milkins’ recovery was a remarkable success story after he suffered the death of both his parents – his mum to cancer when he was only 19 – and his sister less than two years ago.

Flanked by proud kids Charlie, Elisha and Mia, he thanked his close friends Mandy and Dean, godparents to his children, for helping him maintain the self-belief to remain at the coalface with his cue.

This is a bloke who admitted he was “skint” last year as he battled to retain his professional tour card, having won only three matches all season before the Gibraltar Open, two of those coming against Nigel Bond before 00147’s impending retirement.

“I was in such a bad place, I can’t even explain it. I’ve never been like it before. Financially, and my mental state was so bad,” said Milkins.

“I was struggling. I was practising, but not as much as I wanted to. I couldn’t be bothered to do anything. I was struggling to be able to put food down for the kids. I didn’t really want to play.

“I couldn’t afford to get my table recovered, and at times I couldn’t even afford to pay £30 for petrol to go and play against somebody else. I’m moving on now and this win is so big for me.”

Last year is not this year. The second coming of Bob has been more dramatic than Milkins emerging to the rabid scrumpy-inspired sounds of I Am A Cider Drinker by The Wurzels before his matches.

A 4-2 win over Kyren Wilson in the Gibraltar Open final, weeks after his untimely saturated trip to Turkey was the precursor to Milkins realising that he had the sober-suited winning formula within himself.

It is refreshing when good things happen to nice people. The flamboyant manner in which the Milkman delivered in Llandudno was a Welsh rarebit, snooker’s undisputed feel-good story of this or any other season.

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