
After Ronnie O’Sullivan won last year’s World Snooker Championship, battering all five opponents en route to a record-equalling seventh title, the great Clive Everton likened his dominance of the sport to Tiger Woods or Roger Federer.
It is a comparison O’Sullivan has made himself, admitting that legends of golf and tennis set a benchmark against which he judges his own success. The parallels are certainly intriguing, albeit O’Sullivan’s career has played out in a less globally competitive arena in which the greatest threat has come in the shape of middle-aged men from Scotland.