Snooker British Championship: O'Sullivan was crowned the champion of the British Championship for the eighth time Ding Junhui won the runner-up for two consecutive years

China News Service, Beijing, December 12 -- On the morning of the 4th, Beijing time, the 4st "Ding Olympic Games", which attracted much attention in the field of snooker, ended with the failure of Chinese billiards star Ding Junhui. World No. 31 "Rocket" Ronnie O'Sullivan was crowned champion of the British Championship for the eighth time after winning 10-7, and Ding Junhui won the runner-up in the event for two consecutive years.

The final of the 2023 Snooker UK Championship will start on the 3rd local time, with Ding Junhui, the "first brother" of Chinese snooker, facing the "first brother" of world snooker and the British star O'Sullivan. The game is played in two phases with 19 rounds and 10 wins.

At the beginning of this battle, O'Sullivan took the lead and led 3-0. Ding Junhui launched a counterattack when he was 1-4 behind, won 3 games in a row, and at the end of the first stage, chased the score to a 4-4 draw.

After the start of the second stage, the two sides were still-for-tat, and the score was tied at 7-7. But then, Ding Junhui's form declined, and O'Sullivan, who still maintained a good hand, won three consecutive cities and won 10-7, becoming the first eight-time champion in the history of the competition.

In 1993, 18-year-old O'Sullivan won the British Championship for the first time, becoming the youngest winner of the event. Now, the "Rocket", who has lifted the British Championship trophy for the eighth time, is the oldest winner of the event at the age of 48. Over the past 30 years, the British Snooker Championship has witnessed the transformation of the most talented player in snooker history from "rising star" to "superstar".

This is also O'Sullivan's 40th ranking championship and 22nd three-major championship. With the championship prize of 25,<> pounds in this event, O'Sullivan is still firmly in the world hegemony.

Although Ding Junhui, who won the runner-up, once again missed the 15th championship in the ranking competition, his performance and results in this British Championship are remarkable and gratifying.

Due to his poor performance in the first few tournaments of the season, Ding Junhui, who was ranked 17th in the world, did not qualify for the main draw of the British Championships as a seeded player (ranked in the top 16 in the world). But from the beginning of the qualifying round, Ding Junhui passed all the way and eliminated 4 seeded players in the main match one after another. Among them, in the first round of the main event, he defeated the world No. 6 Mark Allen 5-6 with illness, and eliminated the world No. 4 Trump <>-<> in the semifinals.

Facing the "rocket" in the finals, Ding Junhui also showed equal strength with him most of the time. After the game, O'Sullivan said that Ding Junhui can be called China's "godfather of snooker", he is the best cue ball control among all players, and it is an honor to play against him in the final.

The Snooker British Championship is one of the oldest events in the world in the field of professional snooker, and is known as the three major competitions of snooker along with the World Championship and the Masters. Ding Junhui won the championship of the event three times in 2005, 2009 and 2019, and reached the final for the fourth time in the British Championships last year, winning the runner-up. (ENDS)