2000 World Snooker Championship

Tournament summary

• In the final qualifying round Gary Wilkinson and Jason Ferguson set the record of the longest best-of-19-frames match at 11 hours and 38 minutes.
• The pre-tournament favourite Stephen Hendry was eliminated in the first round by Crucible debutant and future world champion Stuart Bingham. Hendry and Bingham would later meet in the first round again in 2012, this time Hendry winning 10-4 and making a maximum 147 break in what was his final professional tournament.
• Despite becoming the first player to make 5 centuries in a first round match at The Crucible, and outscoring his opponent, Ronnie O'Sullivan lost 9–10 to David Gray.
• Gray was unable to maintain this form in the second round and lost 1–13 to Dominic Dale with a session to spare, scoring just 208 points, a record low for a best-of-25 match.
• Joe Swail returned to the top 16 in the snooker world rankings after reaching the semi-final against Matthew Stevens.
• Swail's place in the semi-finals ended Steve Davis' run in the elite top 16 – he had been in since 1980 including holding the world number one spot from 1983 to 1990. Davis lost 11–13 to John Higgins in the second round. He later returned to the top 16 in 2003/2004.
• Higgins made a record of 485 unanswered points in his quarter-final match against Anthony Hamilton.
• Mark Williams became only the third Welsh snooker player to win the world title after Ray Reardon and Terry Griffiths, and the first since 1979. Trailing 7–13 against fellow countryman Matthew Stevens in the final, Williams recorded a comeback to defeat Stevens 18–16 and win the title.
• John Newton refereed his first and only World final and retired from refereeing after the match. This was also the first ever all-Welsh World final and remains only one to-date.

  Prize fund

• Winner: £240,000
• Runner-up: £140,000
• Semi-final: £70,000
• Quarter-final: £35,000
• Last 16: £19,000
• Last 32: £13,000
• Last 48: £10,000
• Last 64: £6,325
• Last 96: £3,850
• Last 128: £1,050
• Stage one highest break: £2,000
• Stage two highest break: £20,000
• Stage two maximum break: £147,000
• Total: £1,460,000

  Main draw

Century breaks

• 143, 120, 114, 114, 112, 111, 110, 109, 108, 104, 103 Matthew Stevens
• 141, 141, 137, 136, 135, 129, 127, 126, 109, 108, 108, 103 John Higgins
• 141, 103, 102 Joe Swail
• 136, 123, 115, 102, 101 Ronnie O'Sullivan
• 133 Drew Henry
• 132 Stuart Bingham
• 126, 102 Stephen Lee
• 123, 112, 106, 105, 101, 101 Mark Williams
• 120, 119, 103, 101, 100 Dominic Dale
• 118, 106, 104, 101 Ken Doherty
• 106 Stephen Hendry
• 102 John Parrott
• 101 Chris Small
• 100 Peter Ebdon

  Qualifying

Round 1–2

Round 3–4