World Snooker Championship: All you need to know

With the 2024 World Snooker Championship commencing on April 20th, we’ve pulled together an all you need to know guide to navigate the most prestigious and longest-running tournament in professional snooker.

What is the World Snooker Championship?

The World Snooker Championship features the top 16 players and 16 qualifiers, whittled down from a 128-player qualifying tournament. It was first held in 1927 and is now one of three tournaments which makes up snooker’s Triple Crown Series.

The ranking event is highly prestigious and is organised by the World Snooker Association. This year’s competition has matched last year’s whopping prize pool of £2,395,000 and the winner will take home the top prize of £500,000, with a £200,000 consolation prize for the runner-up.

First round matchups are best-of-19-frames contests, while both the second round and quarter-finals are best-of-25, with the semi-finals a heavy best-of-33. The final is staged as an epic two-day marathon played as a best-of-35 over four sessions, on 5th and 6th of May.

Where and when is the World Snooker Championship held?

The World Snooker Championship is being held in Sheffield this year at the iconic Crucible Theatre. The event gets underway on April 20th at 10am and will culminate in the final which starts on Sunday the 5th of May and wraps up on the final day of the competition, May 6th.

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Who are the previous winners?

Last year’s World Snooker Champion was Luca Brecel, who won his first tournament at the Crucible. The Belgian defeated Mark Selby in the final 18-15. Brecel was in superb form as he defeated previous champion Ronnie O’Sullivan in the quarterfinals and went on to deny Selby the chance to win another Triple Crown.

The prestigious championship was won an unbelievable 15 times in a row when it first started by Englishman Joe Davis. The ‘modern era’ of the championship is said to have started in 1969 when the World Snooker Association started organising the event, and since then Ronnie O’Sullivan and Stephen Hendry hold the record jointly at seven world titles.

Before the Belgian Brecel was victorious last year, the last time someone from outside Britain had won the competition was in 2010 when Neil Robertson of Australia defied Scotland’s Graeme Dott in the final. Robertson will be taking part this year along with eight previous winners: Luca Brecel, Ronnie O’Sullivan, Mark Selby, Mark Williams, Judd Trump, Stuart Bingham, Shaun Murphy and John Higgins.

What are the odds for the 2024 World Snooker Championship?

Last year’s winner Luca Brecel is a rather large price of 18/1 to lift the trophy this year, with a competitive field all looking to stop him from going back-to-back.

Ronnie O’Sullivan’s list of accomplishments is endless, having won pretty much every snooker tournament on offer. But this year there is an added pressure as O’Sullivan will be looking to follow in the footsteps of Steve Davis (1987-88), Stephen Hendry (1994-95, 1995-96) and Mark Williams (2002-03) who have won all three Triple Crown events in the same campaign.

The Rocket is a 5/2 chance to win, which would give him all three Triple Crown events in one campaign. While a win for anyone else would be a life changing moment, it wouldn’t make history in the way an eighth world title for O’Sullivan would, as it would break his jointly held record with Stephen Hendry.

Carrying his incredible form from the China Open, Judd Trump is next in line for the crown at 4/1. The 34-year-old’s lifestyle can often get in the way and his mentality just isn’t at the elite level of his competitors, with Trump often seeming rattled in big moments. Regardless, the 2019 champion and second seed will still fancy his chances.

Mark Selby is a straight winner; he gets the job done. The 8/1 third favourite will be looking to secure his fifth world title after winning the World Snooker Championship in 2014, 2016, 2017 and 2021. The 40-year-old is currently ranked fifth in the world and will be a formidable force in this year’s competition.

It’s hard to forget the first Aussie to taste victory since 1952, and Neil Robertson is unforgettable in his own right. This is a key tournament for Robertson and, despite relatively poor recent form, it’s hard to assess how he’ll play given how high the stakes are for the 14/1-shot.

Shaun Murphy has not been in the best of form heading up to this tournament, with no real consistency in his performances along the way. He is 25/1 to win the tournament, and at these big odds he can’t be left out of consideration as we don’t know which Murphy will show up.

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