Ronnie O’Sullivan thinks he’s pretty good, would you like an example? Ahead of the World Snooker Championships, which has just kicked off in Sheffield, the six-time world champion mused about other sporting greats. For example in tennis, there are three great players: Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer. It’s just that it’s much easier to win tournaments with Djokovic’s or Nadal’s style of play than with Federer’s. “Nadal is killing you. Djokovic is killing you. They are like machines,” said O’Sullivan, “but Federer is a bit like an artist.”
Of course, O’Sullivan, 46, sees himself as an artist, as Federer. Not as Djokovic or Nadal. And he certainly has the ego to compare himself to a sports legend.
Why not? O’Sullivan has just returned to number one in the world rankings – and at the World Cup in Sheffield the crumple-nosed Brit could actually draw level with Stephen Hendry from Scotland. While O’Sullivan has won more ranking tournaments than Hendry and has set more records in the snooker world, he still leads him in world titles, 7-6. Catching up with Hendry has been O’Sullivan’s big career goal. Record world champion is the title he still lacks.
“I love what he does, but sometimes he’s disrespectful,” says a competitor of O’Sullivan
Mark Selby, Neil Robertson, Judd Trump: There are some players who should have something against it in Sheffield. Even greater is the number of players who have an opinion about O’Sullivan and rub against his ego. Like the Iranian Hossein Vafaei (world number 18), who even openly asked his colleague to resign in an interview before the World Cup. Sure, like everyone else, he’s a big fan of O’Sullivan, but more of young Ronnie than his current version. “I love what he does but sometimes he’s disrespectful, he’s not good for the game,” said Vafaei. His advice: O’Sullivan should resign, it would be better for everyone.
O’Sullivan reacted coolly: He enjoys snooker, so he keeps playing. And anyway: “Do you resign as number one in the world?”
Almost as if on order, O’Sullivan has nevertheless confirmed that his manners are sometimes lacking. In the first round win against his compatriot David Gilbert (10:5 after a deficit of 0:3), he played very well at times, but then he rudely disregarded the traditional good practices of his sport. After missing a relatively light black bullet, O’Sullivan made an obscene gesture caught by the cameras with his right hand at the level of his privates. The disciplinary committee of the world association promptly got involved, because O’Sullivan is not a first-time offender in this respect: in a similar incident in China in 2008, O’Sullivan was fined 2,750 pounds and he also lost 700 world ranking points.
Will the punishment be even more drastic this time? O’Sullivan probably wouldn’t care if he got his seventh world title in return. On the other hand, he has permanently soiled the comparison with Federer: the Swiss would never allow himself to be carried away by such a gesture.