Following their Premier League match this Thursday, John Higgins has been chatting to The Daily Record about his fellow Scot Stephen Hendry…
John said:
“Stephen played really well although I missed a couple of chances.
“It’s going to be tough for him to win another world title although he got to the semi-finals last season.
“But who knows? If Stephen is playing his best snooker anything is possible and that includes a World Championship.
“His motivation is he has done it for so long snooker has been his life, although he has not done himself justice in the ranking events in the last few years.
“He has fallen down the rankings but Stephen will be working doubly hard to get back up there and if he can find his best game and sustain that throughout a tournament he can still lift another major.”
While I agree that Stephen can still win another major if he manages to run into some form, personally I don’t believe that he will be able to win another World Championship now. He just doesn’t seem capable of sustaining his best level of play for the full two weeks these days, though he did perform well at the Crucible this year.
Still though, the win against Higgins this week will have been a boost to his confidence, as will a 6-3 win over Jimmy White in an exhibition match last week which maybe just gave him a lift for Thursday. He will be hoping to carry this form into his opening match of the Bahrain Championship where he faces the man who beat him in Shanghai, Ricky Walden.