Free Running: The Autobiography by Ronnie O'Sullivan Page A

centuries you’ve not got a chance.
    Then I thought, no, just enjoy it, give it your best. That’s all you can do. And I managed to come out of the session 5-3 down, which was also a result. It could easily have been 8-0 or 7-1, so I’d avoided a whitewash and there was still a game on forthe evening session. I’d avoided the embarrassment of getting absolutely hammered and having to come out 7-1 down; I’d done alright. I’d given everything, and there was no more meat on the bone.
    Stephen played so brilliantly he probably felt disappointed going in only 5-3 up. He’d not made as much of it as he could have done, so maybe he was the one in the dressing room beating himself up. I came out in the evening and got to 6-6. It wasn’t the best snooker in the world, but I came in and asked myself, how did I get to 6-6? I’d been outplayed all over the place. Then we came out for the last session and he started missing a few, and I was thinking, game on, it’s the best of five now, I fancy this. I started to feel I was in charge. That’s the thing about snooker, any sport really: so much is psychology – and the psychology swings one way then the other by the second. So I’d taken a battering all day long and then my rewards came later in the match, when you want it to come good for you.
    I was 8-6 up, on the verge of winning, then I played a bad positional shot. I was convinced I’d just thrown it away. I’m on a 40-odd break, in my mind I’ve won the match, I’m doing the winner’s speech and, boom, he clears up. And I was thinking: ‘Oh no, I’ve done it again, got carried away in the moment.’ I wasn’t used to winning, and I tensed a bit. So it went 8-7. Eventually I potted the blue to win it 9-7, and I was twitching like mad. My backhand was shaking like a leaf, my arse was pooping all over the gaffe, 2,500 people in the house, and I was, like, get me out of here; this isn’t the place to crumble and fall apart.
    I’d not been so nervous since a semi-final in the World Championship against Stephen Hendry in 2002. The German Masters is a tournament that loads of snooker fans aren’t even aware of, but this was huge for me. Huge. When the blue wentin, I couldn’t believe it. I was shaking so much I thought I’d miss it by a foot. At first I thought, don’t worry about potting, just get the white safe. Then I told myself, don’t think like that, that’s not how a champion thinks. A champion thinks: ‘That’s going in the hole, pot the blue and get on to the pink; that’s the shot.’ Embrace the moment, I told myself. This is what top sport is about, this is how you separate yourself from the pack. You grab these opportunities, and commit.
    I went back to my chair and I was gone. Exhausted. I thought, I’ve won a tournament, a proper ranking event. After coming out of the Priory and winning the Champions Cup, it was the greatest turning point for me since I’d started playing professionally. That was so massive in 2001 because I’d been drinking and puffing my head off for seven years and I’d come out clean and won this tournament, and I thought, I’m enjoying this, I’ve got a chance. After winning the German last year I felt the same, and I never thought I’d recapture that feeling. I’d been down for more than two years, I’d been knocked by everyone in the game, and I’d proved I still had it in me. I won about €50,000 – not a massive amount, but that was irrelevant.
    Not winning for two years had a big impact on me financially. Not just the prize money. When I started to lose all the time, the sponsor money disappeared or went down. Snooker was unrecognisable financially from when I started. Back in the days of Steve Davis and Dennis Taylor the standard was nowhere near as high, but anyone in the top 30 could make a decent living out of the game. After all, the tournaments were on telly, watched by millions, tens of millions even, and the tobacco sponsors queued up to put their