'Best of enemies' - Ronnie O'Sullivan and Mark Selby is best rivalry since Steve Davis and Alex Higgins

This year, Ronnie O’Sullivan left the pre-tournament controversy to someone else. O’Sullivan, himself a rare straight-talker in the increasingly sanitised world of professional sport, laughed offHossein Vafaei’s bizarre rant against him after the Iranian called for the six-times world champion’s retirement as a way of somehow saving snooker. Ad/> Ironically it felt like a classic O’Sullivan interview, starting with some reasonably argued points before descending into wildly over the top conclusions.

If Vafaei thinks snooker would be better off without the game’s leading box office attraction he should try promoting an event without him and see how ticket sales go. World Championship'Best since O'Sullivan' — White says Zhao can win World ChampionshipAN HOUR AGO Over three decades O’Sullivan has dazzled, entranced, frustrated, annoyed, delighted, disappointed, astounded and ultimately fascinated snooker fans. Even his most begrudging critics would accept he has been an overwhelming force for good.

His 30th World Championship campaign began at the weekend with a 10-5 victory over Dave Gilbert but these are still very early days. To equal Stephen Hendry’s modern record of seven world titles he faces several challenges, including a potential meeting with a player not frightened of taking him on. Mark Selby, winner of four of the last eight Crucible titles, passed his first-round test against Jamie Jones on Saturday.