Crucible curse


The "Crucible curse" refers to the fact that no first-time snooker world champion has defended his title since the tournament moved to the Crucible Theatre, Sheffield in 1977.
The last player to successfully defend his first world title was John Pulman in 1964, when the championship was still decided by challenge matches, and before the tournament relocated to the Crucible Theatre. Since 1977, seventeen world champions have experienced the curse, the most recent being the 2015 World Champion Stuart Bingham who lost his title the following year at the 2016 World Snooker Championship. The current world champion, Judd Trump, was a first-time winner in 2019 and as he defends his title in 2020, his challenge will be to overcome this long-standing "curse".

The curse

The first-time world champions listed below all experienced the "Crucible curse", as they did not successfully defend their title at the following year's World Championship. In the years that are not listed, the "curse" was not applicable because the previous year's championship was won by a player who had held the world title previously.
YearDefending championProgressResultOpponentRef
1980 Terry GriffithsSecond round10–13 Steve Davis
1981 Cliff ThorburnSemi-finals10–16 Steve Davis
1982 Steve DavisFirst round1–10 Tony Knowles
1986 Dennis TaylorFirst round6–10 Mike Hallett
1987 Joe JohnsonFinal14–18 Steve Davis
1991 Stephen HendryQuarter-finals11–13 Steve James
1992 John ParrottQuarter-finals12–13 Alan McManus
1998 Ken DohertyFinal12–18 John Higgins
1999 John HigginsSemi-finals10–17 Mark Williams
2001 Mark WilliamsSecond round12–13 Joe Swail
2002 Ronnie O'SullivanSemi-finals13–17 Stephen Hendry
2003 Peter EbdonQuarter-finals12–13 Paul Hunter
2006 Shaun MurphyQuarter-finals7–13 Peter Ebdon
2007 Graeme DottFirst round7–10 Ian McCulloch
2011 Neil RobertsonFirst round8–10 Judd Trump
2015 Mark SelbySecond round9–13 Anthony McGill
2016 Stuart BinghamFirst round9–10 Ali Carter

Of the 17 players to have won their first world title at the Crucible Theatre, six lost in their first match as defending champion: Terry Griffiths in 1980, Steve Davis in 1982, Dennis Taylor in 1986, Graeme Dott in 2007, Neil Robertson in 2011, and Stuart Bingham in 2016. Only two of the 17 were able to reach the final as defending champions: Joe Johnson in 1987 and Ken Doherty in 1998.
Four players have won consecutive world titles at the Crucible : Steve Davis, Stephen Hendry, Ronnie O'Sullivan, and Mark Selby. All of these players had already experienced the "Crucible curse" after winning their first world title.

Pre-Crucible

Of all first-time world snooker champions, only three have retained their title at the next World Championship: Joe Davis in 1928, his brother Fred Davis in 1949, and John Pulman at his first challenge match in 1964. No player in the modern game has successfully defended a first world title, even before the tournament was staged at the Crucible Theatre.
John Spencer, Ray Reardon and Alex Higgins won the World Championship for the first time before the event was moved to the Crucible in 1977, and failed to retain the title the following year. All three players subsequently won the championship at the Crucible for the first time, but then fell to the "curse" when they failed to successfully defend the title the following year.