2018/2019 Ronnie O'Sullivan snooker season

O'Sullivan's first tournament of the season was the Shanghai Masters, which became an invitational event starting from this season. As the defending champion, he defeated Neil Robertson 6−3 in the last 16,[1] and Stuart Bingham 6−2 in the quarters.[2] In the semi-finals, O'Sullivan met an in form Kyren Wilson, who just won the Paul Hunter Classic and Six-red World Championship back-to-back. Despite falling behind 0−2 in the start, O'Sullivan eventually overcame Wilson 10−6, winning the last 4 frames.[3] Facing Barry Hawkins in the final, O'Sullivan fell behind 4−6 in the first session, but won 4 straight frames after the break and eventually the match 11−9 to defend his Shanghai Masters title.[4] The tournament win also made O'Sullivan the first snooker player to surpass £10 million in career prize money.

O'Sullivan's next stop of the season was to defend his English Open title. He progressed through the first 4 rounds smoothly, beating Kurt Maflin, Allan Taylor, Matthew Stevens and Eden Sharav whilst dropping only 3 frames.[5][6][7][8] On the final frame of his second round match against Allan Taylor, O'Sullivan also made his 15th maximum and his 2nd maximum of the year.[6] O'Sullivan then came through against newcomer Luo Honghao 5−3 after fending off a comeback while leading 2−0 in the quarter-final.[9] O'Sullivan sparked some controversy during the 6th frame of the match, when he fouled a pink with the rest. However, neither players nor the referee noticed the foul and play resumed. Later in his post match interview, O'Sullivan denied feeling the foul, but felt devastated about it.[10] O'Sullivan then met Mark Davis in the semi-finals and was outplayed 1−6 to end his title defence.[11]

O'Sullivan qualified for the Champion of Champions as the winner of 2017 Shanghai Masters, 2017 UK Championship, 2018 World Grand Prix, 2018 Players Championship and 2018 Shanghai Masters.[12] O'Sullivan won his opening match against Stuart Bingham[13] 4–2, then he went to win his group final match against John Higgins[13] 6–3, making 4 centuries on the way. In the semi-finals he defeated defending champion Shaun Murphy[14] 6–3 to progress to his 5th final of the tournament. In the final he faced Kyren Wilson and led by 5−1, 6−3 and 8−5, before Wilson staged a comeback by winning 4 straight frames to go 9−8 in front. In frame 18, when he was 37−61 behind, O'Sullivan fluked a snooker while he was attempting a double on the final red, resulting in him forcing a decider. The final frame was full of drama, with Wilson pushing a red into the middle pocket while attempting to split the pack with the black and O'Sullivan doing a waistcoat foul. Eventually, O'Sullivan cleared up with a century to claim the decider and his 3rd Champion of Champions title.[15]

O'Sullivan next participated in the Northern Ireland Open. In the first round, he whitewashed Soheil Vahedi, making 3 centuries along the way.[16] He then defeated Mei Xiwen 4−1 in the second round,[17] Tom Ford 4–0 in the third round,[18] Zhou Yuelong 4–1 in the fourth round,[18] and David Gilbert 5–2 in the quarter-finals to set up a titanic clash with World No. 1 Mark Selby in the semi-finals.[19] The clash was a high quality affair, with O'Sullivan making 3 centuries and Selby coming from 5−3 down to force a decider. In the deciding frame, Selby fluked a snooker when attempting to pot the last red in the right middle pocket. After several tries to hit the red, O'Sullivan fluked the red into the left middle, then cleared the table to win the titan clash by 2 points.[20] In the final, O'Sullivan faced Judd Trump, and lost 7−9 in another tight affair which neither player could get a 2 frame lead until the end.[21]

In the first round of his defence of the UK Championship Ronnie beat amateur Luke Simmonds 6–1.[22] In the second round O’Sullivan came from 1–4 behind to beat Ken Doherty 6–5.[23] Then in the third round he whitewashed Zhou Yuelong 6–0.[24] In the fourth round he beat Jack Lisowski 6–1.[25] In the quarter-finals he beat Martin O'Donnell 6–1.[26] In the semi-finals Ronnie beat Tom Ford 6–1[27] to reach his 8th UK final. In the final Ronnie beat Mark Allen 10–6[28] and in the process he beat Steve Davis and Stephen Hendry records in winning a record-breaking 7th UK title and 19th Triple Crown. Midway in the tournament after he had won a match, during the post match chat in the studio he engaged in a lengthy and heated debate with Davis and Doherty about the Breakaway tour he threatened to bring about due to discontent with the current ranking system and gruelling tournament schedule.

Ronnie beat Stuart Bingham,[29] Ryan Day[30] and Ding Junhui[31] and reached his thirteenth Masters final where he lost to Judd Trump 4–10.[32] It was his sixth Masters final defeat.

Ronnie made an early exit as defending champion losing to Marco Fu 2–4.[33]

After early wins against Sanderson Lam[34] and Yuan Sijun,[35] Ronnie surprisingly lost to Alexander Ursenbacher 2–4.[36]

O'Sullivan took a stab at the current snooker ranking system by posting a mocking video to social media complete with a heavy Australian accent where he is desperate to compete for ranking points. Many interviews and discussions in this period he would use that heavy Australian accent, which Neil Robertson dubbed as an awful accent that you would have to go deep into the bush to find. Building up to the first final with Robertson, O'Sullivan joked it's an all Aussie final.

As the defending champion, Ronnie was in fantastic form as he beat Barry Hawkins 6–4,[37] John Higgins 6–4,[38] Mark Allen 6–0[39] and in the final Neil Robertson 10–4.[40] In the final frame against Robertson, Ronnie made his 1000th century, thus becoming the first player to achieve such a milestone. The final ball he potted resulted in an in off, otherwise he would have had the tournament's top break.

At the Tour Championship, O'Sullivan eased through Stuart Bingham 9−3,[41] then came back from 2–6 down and 5–8 down to defeat Judd Trump 10−9[42] in a match that went to the final black. In a rematch of the Players Championship final 2 weeks before, O'Sullivan defeated Neil Robertson 13−11[43] to claim his 36th ranking title, equalling Stephen Hendry's record. Consequently, having earned the most prize money in the Coral Cup series for the year he received the Coral Cup trophy. This win also catapulted O'Sullivan back to world number one, 9 years since he last held the spot. The match winning break had Ronnie go in off in exactly the same pocket as the previous final.

At the 2019 World Snooker Championship, O'Sullivan suffered a shock first-round defeat at the hands of 23-year-old debutant James Cahill, the first amateur ever to compete at the Crucible. Trailing 4−5 after the first session, O'Sullivan fell further behind at 5−8, before rallying to level the match at 8−8. However, Cahill won the next two frames to record a 10−8 victory over the reigning world number one, an outcome that was described as "one of the all-time sporting shocks."[44] During the match he played at an exceptionally fast pace even by his standard, averaging 15 seconds a shot though often to his detriment, missing many routine shots such as the final green in the first frame that was match ball. O'Sullivan cited fatigue and poor health in his post match interview and that he was playing by instinct due to these issues.

The following table chronicles all the main tour matches[nb 1] of O'Sullivan.

Tournament	Round	Date (day month)	Opponent (Top 16 Seed)[nb 2]	Score	Centuries made[nb 3]	Tournament century total	Tournament record	Overall season record	Ref.
Shanghai Masters Regal International East Asia Hotel, Shanghai, China, 10–16 September 2018.	2R	12 September	Neil Robertson (10)	6–3		0	1–0	1–0	[1]
	QF	13 September	Stuart Bingham (12)	6–2	140, 111	2	2–0	2–0	[2]
	SF	14 September	Kyren Wilson (9)	10–6	135	3	3–0	3–0	[3]
	W	16 September	Barry Hawkins (7)	11–9	122, 113	5	4–0	4–0	[4]
English Open Crawley K2 Leisure Centre, Crawley, England, 15–21 October 2018.	1R	15 October	Kurt Maflin	4–1	104	1	1–0	5–0	[5]
	2R	17 October	Allan Taylor	4–0	147, 135	3	2–0	6–0	[6]
	3R	18 October	Matthew Stevens	4–1		3	3–0	7–0	[7]
	4R	18 October	Eden Sharav	4–1		3	4–0	8–0	[8]
	QF	19 October	Luo Honghao	5–3	118	4	5–0	9–0	[9]
	SF	20 October	Mark Davis	1–6		4	5–1	9–1	[11]
Champion of Champions Ricoh Arena, Coventry, England, 5–11 November 2018.	1R	6 November	Stuart Bingham	4–2	116, 109	2	1–0	10–1	[13]
	QF	6 November	John Higgins (5)	6–3	137, 114, 109, 101	6	2–0	11–1	[13]
	SF	9 November	Shaun Murphy (1)	6–3	129, 127	8	3–0	12–1	[14]
	W	11 November	Kyren Wilson	10–9	131, 110, 107	11	4–0	13–1	[15]
Northern Ireland Open Waterfront Hall, Belfast, Northern Ireland, 12–18 November 2018.	1R	13 November	Soheil Vahedi	4–0	108, 111, 116	3	1–0	14–1	[16]
	2R	14 November	Mei Xiwen	4–1	119	4	2–0	15–1	[17]
	3R	15 November	Tom Ford	4–0		4	3–0	16–1	[18]
	4R	15 November	Zhou Yuelong	4–1	132	5	4–0	17–1	[18]
	QF	16 November	David Gilbert	5–2	102	6	5–0	18–1	[19]
	SF	17 November	Mark Selby (2)	6–5	112, 114, 135	9	6–0	19–1	[20]
	F	18 November	Judd Trump (5)	7–9	134	10	6–1	19–2	[21]
UK Championship Barbican Centre, York, England, 27 November – 9 December 2018.	1R	29 November	Luke Simmonds	6–1	118, 112	2	1–0	20–2	[22]
	2R	2 December	Ken Doherty	6–5		2	2–0	21–2	[23]
	3R	3 December	Zhou Yuelong	6–0		2	3–0	22–2	[24]
	4R	5 December	Jack Lisowski	6–1	118, 112	4	4–0	23–2	[25]
	QF	7 December	Martin O'Donnell	6–1	106, 102	6	5–0	24–2	[26]
	SF	8 December	Tom Ford	6–1	122	7	6–0	25–2	[27]
	W	9 December	Mark Allen (7)	10–6	101	8	7–0	26–2	[28]
The Masters Alexandra Palace, London, England, 13–20 January 2019.	1R	14 January	Stuart Bingham (12)	6–2	134, 111	2	1–0	27–2	[29]
	QF	17 January	Ryan Day (13)	6–3	119	3	2–0	28–2	[30]
	SF	19 January	Ding Junhui (8)	6–3		3	3–0	29–2	[31]
	F	20 January	Judd Trump (6)	4–10	114, 109	5	3–1	29–3	[32]
World Grand Prix The Centaur, Cheltenham Racecourse, Cheltenham, England, 4–10 February 2019.	1R	4 February	Marco Fu	2–4		0	0–1	29–4	[33]
Welsh Open Motorpoint Arena, Cardiff, Wales, 11–17 February 2019.	1R	12 February	Sanderson Lam	4–2	116	1	1–0	30–4	[34]
	2R	13 February	Yuan Sijun	4–2	120	2	2–0	31–4	[35]
	3R	14 February	Alexander Ursenbacher	2–4	118	3	2–1	31–5	[36]
Players Championship Guild Hall, Preston, England, 4–10 March 2019.	1R	4 March	Barry Hawkins (12)	6–4	106	1	1–0	32–5	[37]
	QF	8 March	John Higgins (13)	6–4	116, 101	3	2–0	33–5	[38]
	SF	9 March	Mark Allen (1)	6–0		3	3–0	34–5	[39]
	W	10 March	Neil Robertson (3)	10–4	134, 116, 105	6	4–0	35–5	[40]
Tour Championship Venue Cymru, Llandudno, Wales, 19–24 March 2019.	QF	19–20 March	Stuart Bingham (7)	9–3	121, 113, 111	3	1–0	36–5	[41]
	SF	21 March	Judd Trump (3)	10–9	134, 130, 100	6	2–0	37–5	[42]
	W	23–24 March	Neil Robertson (4)	13–11	129, 100	8	3–0	38–5	[43]
World Championship Crucible Theatre, Sheffield, England, 20 April – 6 May 2019.	1R	22–23 April	James Cahill	8–10	104	1	0–1	38–6

O'Sullivan's 2018/2019 season overall record was 38–6 (86.36%). His record against players seeded with a rank within the top 16 at the time of their meetings was 20–2 (90.91%).

Bold indicates player was ranked top 16 at time of at least one meeting. Record shown in round brackets indicates their meetings when player was ranked within the top 16 if different from the overall season record. Italic indicates player was ranked world no. 1 at time of at least one meeting. Record shown in square brackets indicates their meetings when player was ranked no. 1 if different from the overall season record. The following list is ordered by number of wins, then reverse ordered by number of defeats and then chronologically ordered:

O'Sullivan reached seven finals and won five titles in the 2018/2019 season:

The following table documents the results of all world ranking tournaments O'Sullivan competed in during the 2018/2019 season and the ranking points he was awarded for each result. Ranking points were distributed according to the prize money schedule.[46] This also represents his total prize money from world ranking results (in £):

The following table documents the results of all non-world ranking tournaments O'Sullivan competed in during the 2018/2019 season and the prize money he was awarded for each result:

The following table documents all high break and maximum prizes (indicated in bold) O'Sullivan received during the 2018/2019 season and the prize money he was awarded for each:

During the 2018/2019 season, O'Sullivan made the following total number of century breaks: