Snooker results: Ali Carter wins his first ranking title for seven years at the German Masters

Ten years on from lifting this same trophy, the Captain came from 2-0 down to run out a highly-convincing winner and bank a cheque for £80,000 that sees him reclaim his place back in the world's top 16.

Ford compiled the highest break of the match in the very first frame of 121 but despite doubling his lead, Carter reeled off seven runs of 60+ including a higher of 120 in the next 11 frames to dominate the contest.

This is the fifth ranking title of Carter's career, ending as drought that stretches back to the 2016 World Open.

Meanwhile, Ford's quest for a first ranking title of his career, which began in 2001, continues but this is the closest he's come since reaching the final of the 2016 Paul Hunter Classic, where he lost to Mark Selby.

The 43-year-old said: “When you play the game as long as I have, you kind of think it won’t happen again, but you have to keep believing.

“I’m really proud of the way I played today. I put Tom under a lot of pressure. It was a massive occasion for both of us, but arguably Tom, he’s after his first trophy, his first ranking event, so I had that in the back of my mind and I just tried to keep the pressure on as much as I could.

“I’ve got a great team behind me now, the people behind me know who they are and I just want to say thank you, and I’m just delighted to be in the winners’ circle again.

“Tom started really well, he made a century, I was 2-0 down. I still felt good, I thought I hadn’t done anything wrong yet and I sort of got going in the middle and won six frames on the spin.

“It’s so pleasing to play some of my best stuff when you’re right under the cosh and I’m really proud of myself.”

Carter also revealed in an interview with World Snooker that his mindset with regard to the final had been impacted by a song by Whitney Houston.

“The journey of getting through the day, all you can see is getting to 10 (frames) seems like an absolute mile away,” Carter said.

“But you get to 10 by getting to one, to two, to three. I said ‘just say in the moment, forget 10, just break it all down into little bits, and step by step’… I heard ‘Step by Step’ by Whitney Houston and it was quite a memorable song, and I just thought ‘yeah, step by step, day by day’ and I’ve got there.”

Carter added, laughing: “The last two or three months I have dreamt three or four times that I’ve won a tournament, and when I’ve woken up I’ve been absolutely distraught because it was a dream!”