Luca Brecel surprisingly won the title as snooker world champion for the first time. The 28-year-old outsider from Belgium won the final against former English champion Mark Selby 18:15 in Sheffield on Monday evening and thus secured the greatest success of his career.
Especially in the first and third session, which Brecel won 6:2, the outsider shone. In addition to the trophy, the new champion will receive prize money of 500,000 pounds, which is the equivalent of around 570,000 euros.
Brecel is the first non-British world champion since Australian Neil Robertson (2010). He defeated three former world champions on his way to the world title at the Crucible Theater. In the round of 16 he defeated the Welshman Mark Williams (13:11), in the quarterfinals he turned a 6:10 deficit against the seven-time champion Ronnie O’Sullivan and still won with 13:10.
Now, in the most important snooker game of the year, he thwarted a fifth world title for Selby, who had gone into the final as favorites. Brecel’s race to catch up in the semifinals was also spectacular: against the Chinese Si Jiahui he turned a 5:14 into a 17:15.
Selby has to wait for his fifth world title after 2014, 2016, 2017 and 2021. The highlight of the final was still achieved by the 39-year-old Englishman: Selby was the first snooker professional ever to play a maximum break in a World Cup final. The 147 points are the perfect game in the billiard variant.
