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Ssb - higgins wins shanghai classic
John Higgins came into the Shanghai Masters without any sort of form after a disappointing 2011/12 season and without much snooker under his belt in the current campaign.
He leaves Shanghai as champion after an astonishing comeback which reaffirms his position as one of the game's all time greats.
He was 7-2 down to an inspired Judd Trump but, as he did from the same position against Mark Williams in the 2010 UK Championship final, recovered to win 10-9.
Trailing 5-0, Higgins made a maximum, the sixth of his career but first since 2004.
It all adds up to one of his best ever performances in a professional career spanning 20 years.
It is 18 years since Higgins won his first ranking title. Shanghai yields him his 25th and he moves above Ronnie O'Sullivan in third place on the overall list with Steve Davis's total of 28 now in touching distance.
It was a classic match but also one of the greatest finals never seen because it was not live on television outside of China which is, to put it mildly, a great shame.
The match, and indeed the semi-finals, prove what we all knew: that snooker is still capable of delivering high drama, particularly if the stakes are high in a major tournament with a big first prize.
This was an excellent tournament with big crowds, even if there were far too many interruptions because of cameras and phones.
Trump will obviously find the defeat hard to take. He got better and better as the week went on and played very well in the final.
He played his full part in the drama on the Grand Stage but the class of '92 are still a formidable bunch.
Higgins, O'Sullivan and Mark Williams were products of a special time which will never come again in the UK, the snooker boom which belongs now to another age: terrestrial television with only four channels meaning that snooker was front and central in the affections of large parts of the nation.
The world has moved on. Snooker is now thankfully more global in terms of its calendar but it will clearly take time for talents of the future to develop into the world class players of Higgins, O'Sullivan and Williams's pedigree.
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He leaves Shanghai as champion after an astonishing comeback which reaffirms his position as one of the game's all time greats.
He was 7-2 down to an inspired Judd Trump but, as he did from the same position against Mark Williams in the 2010 UK Championship final, recovered to win 10-9.
Trailing 5-0, Higgins made a maximum, the sixth of his career but first since 2004.
It all adds up to one of his best ever performances in a professional career spanning 20 years.
It is 18 years since Higgins won his first ranking title. Shanghai yields him his 25th and he moves above Ronnie O'Sullivan in third place on the overall list with Steve Davis's total of 28 now in touching distance.
It was a classic match but also one of the greatest finals never seen because it was not live on television outside of China which is, to put it mildly, a great shame.
The match, and indeed the semi-finals, prove what we all knew: that snooker is still capable of delivering high drama, particularly if the stakes are high in a major tournament with a big first prize.
This was an excellent tournament with big crowds, even if there were far too many interruptions because of cameras and phones.
Trump will obviously find the defeat hard to take. He got better and better as the week went on and played very well in the final.
He played his full part in the drama on the Grand Stage but the class of '92 are still a formidable bunch.
Higgins, O'Sullivan and Mark Williams were products of a special time which will never come again in the UK, the snooker boom which belongs now to another age: terrestrial television with only four channels meaning that snooker was front and central in the affections of large parts of the nation.
The world has moved on. Snooker is now thankfully more global in terms of its calendar but it will clearly take time for talents of the future to develop into the world class players of Higgins, O'Sullivan and Williams's pedigree.
More...
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