Ronnie O’Sullivan claims inaugural Snooker 900 Global Championship title

Ronnie O’Sullivan secured the inaugural Snooker 900 Global Championship title with a 10-5 victory over Luca Brecel in the final on Sunday.

O’Sullivan made it a hat-trick of silverware inside six weeks as he added to his John Virgo Trophy and World Seniors Championship titles with victory in Reading.

The seven-time World Champion overcame Billy Castle in a deciding frame on Friday before dispatching Kyren Wilson 6-4 in Saturday’s semi-finals.

A brilliant mid-match burst helped ‘The Rocket’ beat 2023 World Champion Brecel with the aid of five century breaks in a high quality final.

“I’m enjoying playing,” O’Sullivan told Pluto TV. “It’s the first time in three years where I feel comfortable with my technique, I’m getting through the ball ok.

“Still room for improvement if I want to go down that road, but if you get greedy, sometimes you can lose what you’ve got.

“I think at this stage of my career, I’m just happy to be enjoying it.”

O’Sullivan established a 6-3 lead at the close of the first session, reeling off four frames in a row from 3-2 down with breaks of 106 and 121 along the way.

He then picked up from where he left off when the pair returned for the evening session, firing in a break of 101 to extend his lead.

A break of 70 made it six unanswered frames for O’Sullivan as he opened up an 8-3 advantage, but only for Brecel to hit back with breaks of 68 and 72 to close the gap.

However, O’Sullivan quashed any hopes of a miraculous comeback as he clinched back-to-back frames to become the first name on the new invitational trophy.

The ‘900’ format features frames capped at 15 minutes with a shot clock in operation and fouls penalised by ball in-hand.

O’Sullivan opened expressed his enjoyment of the format and led the calls for Snooker Legends promoter Jason Francis to form a ‘900 tour’.

O’Sullivan added: “I’m the same as Luca, I just love this format, and if Jason can make a tour, I think if you asked 128 players, I reckon 70 per cent of them would say we would rather play under this format, because we’ve played a lot of snooker today but we’re not sitting here until 1 o’clock in the morning. We’re not playing sessions thinking ‘what time will we get something to eat?’

“We know where we are, we just love playing, but at some point you’ve just got to know when you’re clocking on and off.

“Jason has come up with an amazing format and I just think he’s hit the sweet spot with snooker really.

“If he can get some sort of tour going and get some backing, I’m sure this will be here to stay forever.”