Players Championship: Ronnie O'Sullivan beats Shaun Murphy 10-4 for 33rd career ranking title
Ronnie O'Sullivan beat Shaun Murphy 10-4 in the final of snooker's Players Championship as his stunning season continues.
O'Sullivan was gifted several openings early on as Murphy made a series of costly mistakes, allowing the tournament favourite to secure a 6-3 lead heading into the evening session.
From there, Murphy was always up against it and while he registered the highest break of the final, a 137 in frame 11, it would merely earn a brief stay of execution.
O'Sullivan responded with three more half-centuries - eight in total for the match without ever passing 100 - to cruise to a 10-4 victory which sets him up perfectly for the World Championship, for which he's a 9/4 chance with Sky Bet.
“Shaun played an amazing match against Mark Williams yesterday and I was expecting a really tough game but he didn’t turn up like he did last night," said O'Sullivan.
"That made it a little easier for me but I still had to focus and treat every shot with respect."
Victory in Llandudno was O'Sullivan's fifth ranking title of the season - one more would set a new record - and he's closing in on Stephen Hendry's all-time record of 33.
"It’s fantastic to equal the record – I’m over the moon," he said.
Stephen Hendry, now working as a pundit, hailed O'Sullivan as "invincible" yet O'Sullivan maintains that he doesn't always feel it - especially in the build-up to big matches.
"Every match I come into I always get the heebie-jeebies, but once I get out there I start to feel that I fancy it.
"It’s always the build-up when I doubt myself. I’ve just got to try and prolong my career but I can’t play as much as the other guys or I’d get burnt out.
"I need to have a rest now to give myself a chance for the tournaments coming up."
Asked whether he was playing the best snooker of his life, he added: "I'm playing as good as I ever have done. The last six years I’ve played pretty good stuff apart from a year or so when I didn’t focus much on match snooker.
"This year I really have and the results have shown. I’m delighted to still be picking up silverware."