Analysing Barry Hawkins’s first-round Crucible exit

Of all the top-16 players to bite the bullet in the first round of the World Snooker Championship, Barry Hawkins is one of the last anyone would expect to falter. With such a supreme record at the Crucible Theatre, “the Hawk” is usually a reliable pick in the snooker betting to reach the second round.

But not this year. Despite being the clear favourite against World Championship debutant Jackson Page, Hawkins just couldn’t get going, with his young Welsh opponent producing an, at times, blistering display to knock him out.

While the 10-7 loss will have been a shock to the system for Hawkins, the 42-year-old was full of praise for Page, who finally gave the snooker world a proper taste of his nascent qualities on the table.

“The way he finished in the last two frames was very classy,” the world number nine said. “I thought he might feel the pressure but he looked as if it didn’t bother him at all. He has come through the qualifiers and he looked sharp – much sharper than me. The seeds are under pressure in the first round. Mark Williams has been saying for years how good Jackson is and I think we saw that today.”

As well as Page played throughout the match, Hawkins will be disappointed that he didn’t make his experience count. There were times over the two sessions where it looked as though the Englishman was regaining a semblance of control, not least when he won the final frame of the first session after needing a snooker, meaning he trailed 6-3 instead of 7-2 overnight.

Hawkins started the second session the better of the two players, and was just 7-6 behind at the last mid-session interval, but when he asked the question, Page found the answer, finishing the match off with successive total clearances of 128 and 135 respectively.

Despite eventually making it a pretty close fight, Hawkins never truly found his rhythm in the match, failing to find any kind of scoring form. He made just two breaks of over 50 in the whole game, and that simply won’t cut it in a best-of-19 encounter. Compare that with Page’s ten contributions of 50 or more, including three century breaks, and it’s easy to see how the match was decided.

The defeat marks the first time Hawkins has lost in the first round of the World Championship since 2010 – an incredible record that coincided with his appearance in the 2013 final and the semi-finals in four of the five editions of the tournament that followed. Although he had lost in the second round of the three World Championships prior to this one, Hawkins was still seen as safe bet in the snooker tips to get the better of Page.

Alas, it wasn’t meant to be, and it’s natural to wonder whether Hawkins will ever threaten the latter stages of the World Championship again, given both his age and his gradual decline in recent Crucible campaigns. He’ll go away and reflect on a disappointing performance, wondering whether his best chances of getting his hands on the famous World Championship trophy have passed him by. 

The editorial unit