Snooker: Williams desperate for clash of the golden oldies in World Championship final

Large swathes of Mark Williams’ snooker career blur together but he would certainly remember one last World Championship final against old rival and fellow 40-something John Higgins.

The old guard are firing on all cylinders at this year’s Betfred World Snooker Championship – 43-year-old Williams is right in his best-of-33 semi-final against 39-year-old Barry Hawkins, trailing 9-7 heading into Saturday’s final two sessions.

Meanwhile, the other last-four clash at Sheffield’s Crucible Theatre has 42-year-old John Higgins taking on the next generation’s sole representative in 26-year-old Kyren Wilson.

Higgins won the first of his four world titles back in 1998, while Cwm cueman Williams was king of the world in 2000 and 2003.

The duo turned professional together – along with a certain Ronnie O’Sullivan – way back in 1992 and the prospect of meeting Higgins on the biggest stage all these years later has the Welshman salivating.

“John Higgins is going for his fifth world title, I am going for my third, and there are a couple of lads who haven’t won it before in the semis,” said Williams. “Someone will have a big smile on Monday.

Crazy

“It would be unbelievable to have two forty-somethings in the final if me and John somehow made it – that would be crazy after all these years.

“And both of us are just enjoying this one, you can tell that. Let’s hope it can happen.

“The years fly by, I don’t know where they have gone. It is 26 years ago now I was in a bed and breakfast in Blackpool [before his first professional tournament], three of us in a room, sharing a double bed with my mate Ian!

“I couldn’t even remember my last semi-final at the Crucible before this year, until someone reminded me it was against John back in 2011!

“As far as I am concerned I came through and have played throughout my career alongside two of the greatest players ever [Higgins and O’Sullivan].

“So to manage to nick as many titles as I have with those two around, and I accept they are in a different league to me, I do sit back sometimes and give myself a lot of credit.”

There is work to do for Williams if he is to reach a fourth World Championship final, although he has battled to remain in touch in his last-four contest.

Hawkins led 5-3 overnight heading into Friday afternoon’s session but Williams soon levelled the match at 5-5 without his opponent scoring a point.

However, Hawkins is as comfortable as perhaps any player in the one-table set-up at the Crucible, having reached the World Championship semi-finals in five of the last six years, and took four of the next five frames – breaks of 63, 57 and 56 the highlight – to establish a healthy 9-6 advantage.

But, much like in Thursday’s opening session, Williams – gunning for his first world title for 15 years – crucially clinched the final frame of the day as a break of 62 narrowed the deficit to 9-7, with 17 frames the target for victory.

The veteran Welshman has made headlines at the Crucible this year by promising to do his post-match press conference naked should he win the title and although he is starting to regret that, he is showing no signs of reneging.

He laughed: “I thought I might have got away with it until I saw the newspapers and the headlines, and thought ‘Oh sh*t!’

“But I am a man of my word, it’s a bit of fun and if I have picked up £425,000 [for winning the title] then no real problems.”

Watch the snooker World Championship LIVE on Eurosport and Eurosport Player with Colin Murray and analysis from Ronnie O’Sullivan, Jimmy White and Neal Foulds.