Ronnie O’Sullivan is not optimistic about his hopes to attain an eighth World Snooker Championship title.
The 49-year-old is regarded as the greatest snooker player of all time, but he has been mainly absent this season on medical grounds.
The World Championship winner will claim £500,000GettyThe last time O’Sullivan played competitively was in January in the Championship League.
As a result, he is down in 31st on the one-yearranking list, meaning he missed out on the chance to compete at The Players and Tour Championships.
And with the World Snooker Championship coming up, huge questions were raised over whether O’Sullivan would be absent.
However, he confirmed his participation despite mixed emotions about his return.
When asked about whether he missed snooker in his time away from the sport, O’Sullivan replied: “Yes and no. It’s a strange one but it was good to have some time out.”
Judd Trump and Mark Selby are among the bookies’ favourites but it would be wrong to disregard O’Sullivan.
But no matter what fans think, he is not in the most positive frame of mind.
“Okay, not great,” he said when asked about his pre-tournament preparation. “The cue is fine, it’s just me.”
The Crucible could heat up quickly for O’Sullivan who will face Ali Carter in the first round.
Carter has lost two World Championship finals to O’Sullivan.
The winner of O’Sullivan v Carter will face either Anda Zhang or Junxu PangAFPAnd last year after a heated Masters match O’Sullivan called Carter ‘not a nice person’ and a ‘nightmare’ to play against.
The two are scheduled to play on Tuesday.
Speaking more about his form before the tournament, O’Sullivan said: “I tried a new technique six years ago and I think it’s completely stopped me from playing how I used to, and I don’t know how to get back to somewhere near how I want to play.
“I’m not sure it’s fixable at this stage of my career, but I will give it a couple of years to try and rediscover a way of playing where I feel like I can hit the ball.
“At the moment it’s pretty scary – the white ball is doing things I’ve never seen it do before.
“I’ve lost that instinctiveness and what I’m seeing when I’m down on the shot is not good.
“Everyone has days when they lose their timing but when you compound that over a four-year period it’s quite hard – where do you start to put it right?”
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