Latest news with #TheWizardofWishaw
Daily Mirror
30-04-2025
- Sport
- Daily Mirror
Mind-blowing John Higgins response after Mark Allen's 'sad' comment and retirement threat
Four-time world snooker champion John Higgins bowed out of the Crucible following defeat to Mark Williams, but he has proved one of his doubters wrong nonetheless Snooker icon John Higgins has been playing like a man possessed since Mark Allen suggested he was "sad" watching 'The Wizard of Wishaw' struggle for results. Allen made the comment after beating one of snooker 's greatest servants in the first round of the 2024 Masters, at which point Higgins was three years removed from his most recent ranking title. The 49-year-old Scot ended that drought this past March when he beat Joe O'Connor to clinch the World Open title. And although his 2025 World Snooker Championship ended with a quarter-final defeat to Mark Williams on Wednesday, his displays in Sheffield have proved he's not to be discounted just yet. "I know that John had his chances and I feel for John. Not out there I didn't, I wanted him to miss every shot he played, but I feel for him now," said Allen almost 18 months ago. "He's a really good guy, and he looks like someone who is just struggling to get over the line. If he just believed in himself a bit more, he'd be winning tournaments again." While those remarks may have been intended as encouragement towards his peer, it wasn't long after that there was talk of Higgins retiring from the sport. And the veteran himself appeared to hint at a permanent exit after losing to Allen once more at the 2024 Tour Championship, just a few months after his rival's "sad" comments. "I've always said to myself I'd love to still be a seed and in the top 16 competing at the Masters when I'm 50," said the Scot, who will turn 50 in May. "Staying in that bracket throughout my whole career would be a good milestone. "If I reach that one, then I'll maybe be looking to see where my life is at that moment. Not my snooker life but my personal one." Fast forward to today, however, and it's evident Higgins' place is on the World Snooker Tour competing with the best in the business. The finest of margins kept him from reaching a 12th World Championship semi-final after a clutch miss on the blue saw him succumb 13-12 to Williams. Despite the end result, the performance was the latest in a list of impressive showings this season. And there appears to be at least some overlap between Allen's pointed remark on Higgins' confidence and the recent pick-up in his play. It wasn't long after his win at the World Open that Higgins followed up with another major win at this year's Tour Championship at the beginning of April. In fact, the Lanarkshire legend has made it to at least the last eight of the last five consecutive ranking tournaments. As well as Allen's comment possibly acting as motivation in itself, it seems too coincidental that results have picked up for Higgins in the year or so since he started consulting a sports psychologist. It was at the start of 2024 that The Wizard of Wishaw revealed he was receiving aid on the mental side of his game to dispel some "negative thoughts". "I'm speaking to someone because there has been negative thoughts," he told Metro in February last year. "There's no beating about the bush, obviously in the last week while I've lost some big matches, and they would always surface, every time, so I'm trying to speak to someone about that, having more positive thoughts and who knows?" The snooker world at large now has at least some idea following his pick-up in results this season. Ronnie O'Sullivan is another firm advocate for employing a mentality coach after his work with Dr. Steve Peters, with 'The Rocket' on the verge of reaching the World Championship semis himself. "I've had a good season, the atmosphere out there was incredible, a standing ovation walking in," Higgins told the BBC following his agonising defeat to Williams, choosing to focus on the positives of the day. "There's no better place to play, win or lose."
Daily Mail
22-04-2025
- Sport
- Daily Mail
14 years after winning his last world title, can Wizard of Wishaw Higgins still cast a spell at the Crucible?
Seven months ago, John Higgins slipped out of the world's top 16 and Father Time looked set to snap up another all-time great of snooker. To the 49-year-old Scot's credit, he clambered back into the top echelon of the sport to qualify for The Masters in January. In the race to six frames, Higgins breezed into a 5-0 lead over Neil Robertson. He looked every inch the four-time world champion of old. Alas, Robertson battled back to win 6-5 and Higgins was knocked out at the first round. It was the latest agonising defeat on one of the big stages for 'The Wizard of Wishaw'. His powers looked to be on the wane. Fast forward to mid-April and Higgins has won two professional titles in 2025 and is ranked third in the world. So, can the wizard really pull out one more rabbit out of the hat and win a fifth world title? He certainly still has a few tricks up his sleeve. Winning breeds confidence and now that Higgins has rediscovered his belief, he's a dangerous opponent for anyone in the upcoming fortnight in Sheffield. The Scot's participation in this year's world championship was thrown into doubt. Days before the tournament, his father-in-law suffered a heart attack. Thankfully, he is now at home recovering. Higgins had limited time to prepare for a tough first-round clash with Joe O'Connor. In a war of attrition, the Scot prevailed 10-7 in a tense affair and Higgins admitted he was 'drained' afterwards. With a tricky first-round tie out the way, the Scot will be hoping to kick on. He plays world No 14 Xiao Guodong in round two. The Crucible Theatre has penned plenty of fairytales. Ronnie O'Sullivan and Stephen Hendry winning seven world championships and Dennis Taylor's victory over Steve Davis on the black ball in the deciding frame from 1985 are all etched in the mind of every fan no matter what age. Higgins winning a fifth world title — 14 years after his fourth — and becoming the oldest world championship winner ever? It would be quite the tale in what has been, and still is, an incredible career. It would merit a place in snooker folklore. His confidence was low at the turn of the year and the first-round defeat to Robertson looked destined to hasten what appeared to be the final chapter in Higgins' career. Before winning the World Open in China last month, Higgins had gone four years without a professional World Snooker Tour title. His defeat of O'Connor in Yushan lit a fire under the Scot. It ended a lengthy wait for a trophy and stopped a rot of five successive defeats in finals - three of them in a last-frame shoot-out. The Tour Championship is the last event in the calendar before the worlds and Higgins claimed that title, too. He declared it as 'the best win of his career.' No wonder given the circumstances. Higgins had experience on his side as he defeated O'Connor 10-6 in China, breaking the record for being the oldest player to win a professional tournament since Ray Reardon in 1982. It would not be so simple against a fellow four-time world champion in Mark Selby. The final in Manchester just over a fortnight ago was a topsy-turvy affair. Higgins flew out the traps and charged into a 5-1 lead in the race to ten frames. The Englishman flipped the script and turned that deficit into an 8-5 lead. The scars of old were looming large again but Higgins dug deep to win the last five frames and take a high-quality final 10-8 where eight centuries were made, four by each player. This was a vintage performance that showed every characteristic in Higgins' 33-year long professional career. A masterclass in break-building, solid safety play and a will to win that was simply unrivalled in his pomp. There were no weaknesses, not this time. 'It's my best win ever,' said Higgins, who boasts 33 professional career wins and nine Triple Crown titles. 'You are playing a monster of a player and to be 5-1 up then 8-5 down, you don't come back and win five in a row against Selby normally. I managed to do it, so it's incredible.' Selby noted: 'He (Higgins) is incredible and that's why he's an all-time great. The way he played from 8-5... I put it to him and he stood up like the warrior he is.' Higgins is a rejuvenated character and, in the main draw in Sheffield, he's the last Scot standing before the tournament has even begun. Stephen Maguire, Scott Donaldson and Ross Muir all failed to qualify, while young Liam Graham also failed to emerge from the gruelling qualification process but is one to watch in future. The last time Scotland had just one player in the main draw was 1990. That was Stephen Hendry. He won the tournament, which was the first of his seven world titles, and was the third seed. A positive omen if ever there was one. It's been 14 years since Higgins prevailed at the Crucible. En route to that fourth world title, he was infamously heckled in the 2011 semi-final against Mark Williams by a member of the crowd over alleged match-fixing. When leading 14-13 and at the table in the semi-final, someone yelled: 'How did you swallow 300,000, John?' Higgins was fined £75,000 and given a six-month ban for bringing the game into disrepute and failing to tell authorities he was approached to breach betting rules when caught in a newspaper sting in Ukraine in 2010. In Kyiv, Higgins and his then-manager were filmed appearing to agree a fee of £300,000 to lose specific frames. His manager was suspended for life. Higgins was cleared of match-fixing and vowed to restore his reputation but the fact he was world No 1 at the time of the incident was a sorry episode for a sport that's had plenty of alleged match-fixing problems. Higgins was, by a long way, the most high-profile player to be wrapped up in it all. That incident will always haunt him but there's no denying his status as an all-time great, His longevity and mental toughness at the top table along with the other two members of the 'Class Of 92' in O'Sullivan and Williams is nothing short of remarkable. Now that he's rediscovered the art of winning, Higgins has a huge chance of becoming a five-time world champion. Whether, at the age of 49 and a month before his 50th birthday, he has the staying power to get over the line is questionable but it would be foolish to write an in-form Higgins off. 'The Wizard of Wishaw' could cast his spell over The Crucible once again.
Scottish Sun
21-04-2025
- Sport
- Scottish Sun
‘We're civil but we've never been close' – Higgins on his relationship with ‘Class of 92' rivals O'Sullivan and Williams
Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) SCOTTISH snooker legend John Higgins has seen some extreme highs and lows in the sport. After a major decline at the beginning of this season which saw him drop out of the world's top 16 for the first time in nearly 30 years, the man from Wishaw is back on form. 5 John Higgins has turned around bad form which had him doubting the trajectory of his career Credit: Getty 5 'The Wizard of Wishaw' dropped out of the top 16 after a horror start to the season Credit: PA 5 Victory at the World Open and Tour Championship put him back on track Credit: Getty Higgins scooped the 32nd ranking title of his career at the World Open, then won the Tour Championship to put the bad memories of that rocky stretch to bed. Reflecting on the difficult spell, Higgins told the Daily Record: "It was a concern. "The trajectory of my career… I wasn't dropping like a stone, but I was steadily losing places every year, which eventually put me outside the top 16. "You obviously start thinking that your time might be up at the top end of the game, it's only natural. "But it shows you what happens in sport, fast forward a few months and it's flipped on its head again. "[The World Open win] reinforces a bit of belief that you can still do it. "I've always been open about my mental state, I'd been getting pretty down. "At critical points in matches, I seemed to be falling down and that takes it toll on you." Higgins, who would become the oldest-ever Snooker World Championship winner if he cleans up at Crucible this year, is a member of the 'Class of 92' group alongside fellow legends Ronnie O'Sullivan and Mark Williams. The trio all debuted in the same year, and whilst Higgins' return to form is in contrast to the struggles of his two rivals, he revealed his continuing respect for the pair. Kyren Wilson rolls his eyes at World Snooker Championship announcer live on BBC as 'curse' is instantly brought up He added: "I've said it numerous times, to be classed with those two legends of the game is special. "You don't really know you're part of something [special] until you retire, you'll look back and think, 'that was good'. "33 years and counting and the three of us are still up near the top eight of the game. "We get on, we're civil but we've never been close because you've always been fighting for titles with them. 5 Higgins and O'Sullivan have won 11 World Championships between them Credit: PA:Press Association 5 Williams has struggled with his eyesight recently but remains in this year's championship Credit: PA "You respect them, yeah, they're unbelievable players. "It's the hardest standard we've ever had in snooker, without a doubt, so I'm proud I'm still up there competing. "The time I stop playing at the Crucible is the time I'll stop having my birthdays. "I've played there 30-odd years - it's more than half my life - every April and May at the Crucible. "It'll be a sad day when you don't get to go there." Keep up to date with ALL the latest news and transfers at the Scottish Sun football page
