Hendry - will know when to quit.
ONE-MAN DOMINATION OVER - HENDRY
By Ronnie Esplin, PA Sport
Click here for full Embassy draw and schedule
Snooker's greatest ever player, Stephen Hendry, claimed modern day players
will not make the sacrifices needed to dominate the sport in the way Steve Davis
and he did throughout the 1980s and 1990s.
The Scotsman took over from Davis as snooker king-pin to dominate the game
throughout the last decade but Hendry insists that type of one-man stranglehold
on honours is a thing of the past.
Hendry, who takes on Gary Wilkinson in the first round of the World
Championship at the Crucible at the weekend, said: "It looks like the days of
someone dominating the game the way Steve Davis and I used to do is over.
"It's not a criticism of the top players but I don't think they want to
dominate the game like that.
"Ronnie O'Sullivan won two tournaments in a row and wanted to take a break
from the Scottish Regal before the World Championships. If it was me, I would
have wanted to win them all.
"I notice players are saying 'I'm taking a week off here and I don't want to
practise or I want another life'.
"But whether it's right or wrong, Steve and I wanted to win everything and we
wanted to work as hard as we could to achieve our goals.
"But everyone's different and I don't think players want to dedicate their
whole life to being the best player and dominate snooker.
"I had to make sacrifices. I've got a family now and a life away from snooker
but when I was coming up and dominating, snooker was everything and I had
virtually no life outside of that. But I don't regret a minute of it."
In recent years Hendry has lost his cloak of invincibility but is still a
force to be reckoned with, demonstrated when he got to the final at the Crucible
last year only to be beaten 18-17 by Peter Ebdon.
But the Scotsman insisted he will not go down the Steve Davis route and play
for fun when he no longer can compete for the top honours.
He said: "As long as I feel I can compete then that will be good enough for
me. If I was sitting beside one of the top players and I felt that he was too
good for me then I would seriously think about packing it in.
"I don't know if I would be like Steve and just play for the challenge. He's
obviously got used to the fact that he's not good enough to win tournaments
regularly but I don't know how long it would take me to get used to it."
Click here to send us your sporting feedback
