Ronnie O’Sullivan has threatened to throw in the towel on his legendary snooker career after an ’embarrassing’ defeat in the last 16 of the All England Open.
The seven-time world champion fell 4-2 in Brentwood to 64th-ranked player He Guoqiang at the stage he entered the tournament.
In a self-deprecating outburst, O’Sullivan called himself “absolutely useless” and cast doubt on his future in the sport he has dominated since his first World Championship title in 2001.
Asked why he has been playing left-footed, he told The Sun: “I’m completely useless, that’s why. Forget the World Cup. To be honest, it doesn’t even bother me – if I’m going to play badly, I might as well do it left-footed.”
‘Play with your left hand and enjoy it, but be useless, or play with your right hand, be useless and don’t enjoy it.
Ronnie O’Sullivan calls himself ‘absolutely useless’ after crash at the English Open
The snooker legend has claimed he could retire soon after losing 4-2 to He Guoqiang in the last 16.
“I don’t have much time left, I’m not going to deny it, I’m not playing well enough, there’s no point even worrying about it. I’ve just accepted it and it’s a pretty nice situation to be in really.”
It is not the first time O’Sullivan has talked about retirement and the past year has brought much joy for the 48-year-old, with titles at the World Grand Prix, UK Championship, Shanghai Masters, The Masters and World Masters of Snooker.
However, despite being ranked fourth in the world, she admitted she may only have a couple more years left in her career.
On Tuesday night in Essex, where he lives, O’Sullivan fought back from three frames down against He to make the score more competitive, but a series of errors in the sixth presided over his downfall.
“I feel terrible, it’s embarrassing. I miss a lot of balls. I can’t escape it, poor thing, but I can’t do anything about it,” he added.
‘I’ve been missing balls for the last four or five years and every now and then I’ll miss a few less, maybe, and get a couple of results.
“I don’t even care, I’m just here to fulfill my commitments to my sponsors, get away from home, travel.”
O’Sullivan won his final World Championship in 2022, beating Judd Trump 18-13 to equal Stephen Hendry’s record of seven world titles.
“Forget about the World Cup. I don’t even mind being honest with you,” he told his followers.
He Guoqiang led 3-0 before O’Sullivan clawed back a couple of frames but the world number 64 kept his cool.
Following her latest comments, it remains to be seen whether she has enough energy to challenge for a record eighth world title in April and May 2025.
Earlier this year, he said he was considering switching to Chinese 8-ball billiards, a new type of billiards.
“Any snooker sport fascinates me, so I’m looking at how popular Chinese 8-ball snooker is in China right now. It’s huge, huge. I’m trying to see if there’s interest in me going there and playing snooker at some point,” he told Let’s Meet in Shanghai.
‘I can’t just keep playing snooker against youngsters, grinding it out, match after match, I don’t want to play just for the sake of playing. I want to keep playing for the next 10 or 15 years, earning a living and having fun.
‘China is a place I like to go to, obviously it’s a very popular sport there, but I’ll have to see what my sponsors are like because at the moment they are sponsoring me as a snooker player, but I’m trying to see if they will sponsor me as a pool player.
‘For me it’s all about keeping my sponsors happy, it doesn’t matter if I play pool, snooker or whatever. I just want to have a good life. They pay my bills, my salary, so obviously I have to keep them happy and if they want me to keep playing snooker, I’ll have to keep playing.
“If it’s okay with you guys that I play pool, I’ll definitely do it. I’d have to get used to the game, but it wouldn’t take me long.”
