Legends cue up for the Crucible party
4. What is the name of Paul Pogba’s older brother, whom he faced in Manchester United’s ?Sain?t-Etie?nne??1??to? Europa League tie against MENTION the words ‘the Crucible’ and there is no hesitation about which sporting event it stages.
And when the players walk out on Saturday morning for the start of this year’s World Snooker Championship, they will do so with birthday celebrations in the air.
It is 40 years since the Sheffield venue staged its first tournament, a setting that has become one of the greatest theatres in sport.
A venue that staged the epic 1985 black-ball drama between Dennis Taylor and Steve Davis.
One that, five years earlier, had seen Cliff Thorburn sharing live TV coverage with the SAS storming the Iranian Embassy during his final with Alex ‘Hurricane’ Higgins.
Now, champions from the last 40 years will strut their stuff tomorrow.
Thorburn, Davis and Taylor will be joined by Terry Griffiths, Stephen Hendry, John Parrott and recent winners such as Ronnie O’Sullivan and reigning champ Mark Selby in walking down through Tudor Square and assembling in the amphitheatre to start the party.
With its unique atmosphere, the 950-seat capacity and cramped infrastructure owes its fame to a chance visit to the theatre by Carole Watterson, wife of former promoter Mike, who was looking for a new home for the tournament after the 1976 staging in Manchester. The rest is history. Feared Canadian Thorburn, the ‘grinder’ and still a regular visitor, won that grudge match with Higgins 37 years ago.
The two players had come to blows away from the table and Higgins had a victory cake delivered to his dressing room with the score at 16-16, only for Thorburn to win 18-16.
But it was a match being played out while the world was gripped by events in London.
“We had been aware of the siege and there was extra security at the Crucible that day,” said Thorburn. “They cleaned lobby areas out and there seemed to be security guys walking around kicking a few bags – things have probably come a long way since.
“One thing I was told was that one of the SAS guys who got hurt didn’t want to go to hospital but back to the barracks to watch the end of our final. And the story went PRIME-TIME TV: Margaret Thatcher is said to have watched Dennis Taylor v Steve Davis, 1985, final
The most famous of them all, a scarcely believable contest and climax that saw Taylor come back from 8-0 down to win 18-17 on the final black.
Stephen Hendry v Jimmy White, 1994, final
The sixth and last time the ‘Whirlwind’ would reach the final, and the fourth he would lose to his nemesis Hendry, with the Scot edging it 18-17.
Alex Higgins v Jimmy White, 1982, semi-final
The two most popular players in the game served up a treat, with White up against his boyhood idol. Higgins produced one of the best breaks in Crucible history to level at 15-15 before closing out the match.
Cliff Thorburn v Terry Griffiths, 1983, last 16
Canadian Thorburn made the first 147 maximum break seen at the iconic venue. The match finished at 3.51am in front of 200 hardy fans.
Ronnie O’Sullivan v Peter Ebdon, 2005, quarter-final
Defending champion O’Sullivan was cruising at 8-2 up, before Ebdon slowed things down, taking three minutes on one shot. O’Sullivan collapsed as Ebdon won 13-11.
that Margaret Thatcher came round to congratulate the soldiers on the end of the siege and sat and watched the final with this one for a while.
“I don’t know how true that is, but who would make that up?”
Jimmy White suffered agonies at the Crucible, losing all six finals he featured in and four to the same player in Hendry.
But the ‘Whirlwind’ took part in some of the most memorable. He said after losing the 1994 final to Hendry: “He’s beginning to annoy me.”
Arguably snooker’s watermark was the Taylor-Davis final in 1985, one that saw Taylor recover from 8-0 down against the defending champion and game’s dominant force.
Somehow Taylor, spurred on by the memory of his mother who had passed away that season, recovered to win 18-17 on the last ball at 12.19am, with the live BBC cameras still rolling.
Taylor says: “I was so grateful not to have to use the rest for that last black.
“When it went in, the first thing I did was stand there brandishing the cue above my head, then it was stamping it on the floor – and that was 13 years of trying and hope coming out, having come so close in 1979.
“I certainly didn’t have any celebration planned – then came the wagging of the finger.”
The Crucible’s Greatest Matches by Hector Nunns is published tomorrow by Pitch Publishing priced at £17.99 hardback.