The 2010 World Snooker Championship (also referred to as the 2010 Betfred.com World Snooker Championship for the purposes of sponsorship) was a professional ranking snooker tournament that took place between 17 April and 4 May 2010 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England.
John Higgins, who entered the tournament as the defending champion, lost in the second round 11–13 against Steve Davis.
In the semi-finals, Neil Robertson defeated Ali Carter 17–12 and Graeme Dott beat Mark Selby 17–14. Robertson won the final 18–13, becoming the first Australian in the modern era to win the title. Ivan Speck of the Daily Mail said that if "it not been the world championship final, it would have been unwatchable", further expanding that "it was unbearable". The tournament was sponsored by online casino Betfred.com.
Debutants at the Crucible were Tom Ford and Zhang Anda. It was also the first time that Zhang has qualified for the main event of any ranking event. Ford played against Mark Allen and Zhang against Stephen Hendry, losing 4–10 and 9–10 respectively.
Leo Scullion refereed at the Crucible for the first time in his career.
Steve Davis qualified for the World Championship for a record 30th time, spanning over five different decades since his first appearance in 1979. He defeated Mark King 10–9 in the first round, making him the oldest man since Eddie Charlton in 1989 to win a match at the Crucible.
Four out of the sixteen seeded players lost their first-round matches. Mark King lost 9–10 against Steve Davis, Marco Fu lost 9–10 against Martin Gould, Peter Ebdon lost 5–10 against Graeme Dott and Ryan Day lost 8–10 against Mark Davis.
Steve Davis defeated defending champion John Higgins 13–11. With this he reached the quarter-finals of the World Championship for the first time since 2005, and became the oldest player to reach the quarter-finals since Eddie Charlton in 1983.
In the same match Higgins made his 100th century break at the Crucible, becoming only the second player after Stephen Hendry to reach this milestone. It was a break of 115 and it came in the 18th frame of the match.
Meanwhile, Neil Robertson came back from 0–6 and 5–11 to defeat Martin Gould 13–12.
Mark Allen made the first 146 break in the history of the Crucible during his match against Mark Davis.
Steve Davis and Dennis Taylor played a one-frame exhibition match on 29 April, marking the 25th anniversary of the 1985 World Championship final which saw Taylor defeat Davis 18–17 on the final black.
In the re-creation, all but one of their attempts to recreate missed shots on black failed, which means the black was potted on each occasion and Taylor's attempt to recreate the frame-winning ball also went wrong.
Robertson defeated Ali Carter 17–12, becoming the first overseas player since Cliff Thorburn in 1983 and the first Australian since Eddie Charlton in 1975 to reach the final of the World Championship, and the first Australian finalist at the Crucible.
Graeme Dott beat Mark Selby 17–14, to reach his third final after also doing so in 2004 and 2006.
Before the start of the final it was announced that provisional world No. 1 John Higgins had been suspended by the WPBSA following a News of the World story alleging that he had agreed to lose frames in future tournaments in return for money.
The final was between Scot Graeme Dott and Australian Neil Robertson, marking the first time since 2003 that no English player appeared in the final.
Robertson won the title, having defeated only one top sixteen player during the tournament. In the first round he beat Fergal O'Brien (No. 31), in the second round Martin Gould (No. 46), in the quarter-final Steve Davis (No. 23) and in the final he beat Graeme Dott (No. 28). Robertson's only match with a top-sixteen player was in the semi-finals, where he beat Ali Carter (No. 5) decisively.
Robertson became the first Australian to win the title in the modern era, and only the second after Horace Lindrum, who won the controversial 1952 championship. Robertson also became the first player from outside Britain and Ireland to win the title since Cliff Thorburn in 1980 and the first non-British player to win the title since Ken Doherty in 1997.
Robertson hoped his win would help lift the low profile of snooker in his home country, a prospect supported by a number of local sports promoters.
The breakdown of prize money for this year is shown below:
Main draw
Shown below are the results for each round. The numbers in parentheses beside some of the players are their seeding ranks (each championship has 16 seeds and 16 qualifiers). The draw for the televised stage of the World Championship was made on Thursday, 11 March at 11 am BST.
The preliminary qualifying rounds for the tournament took place on 26 February 2010 at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield. (WPBSA members not on The Tour.)
Round 1
Round 2
The qualifying rounds 1–4 for the tournament took place between 27 February and 5 March 2010 at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield. The final round of qualifying took place between 7 and 9 March 2010 at the same venue.
Round 1
Rounds 2–5
There were 50 century breaks in the qualifying stage of the World Championship:
There were 60 centuries in the televised stage of the World Championship.
