Seven months ago, John Higgins slipped out of the world’s top 16 and Father Time looked set to snap up another all-time great of snooker.
To the 49-year-old Scot’s credit, he clambered back into the top echelon of the sport to qualify for The Masters in January. In the race to six frames, Higgins breezed into a 5-0 lead over Neil Robertson. He looked every inch the four-time world champion of old.
Alas, Robertson battled back to win 6-5 and Higgins was knocked out at the first round. It was the latest agonising defeat on one of the big stages for ‘The Wizard of Wishaw’. His powers looked to be on the wane.
Fast forward to mid-April and Higgins has won two professional titles in 2025 and is ranked third in the world.
So, can the wizard really pull out one more rabbit out of the hat and win a fifth world title?
He certainly still has a few tricks up his sleeve. Winning breeds confidence and now that Higgins has rediscovered his belief, he’s a dangerous opponent for anyone in the upcoming fortnight in Sheffield.
Higgins celebrates his win over Mark Selby in the Tour Championship final earlier this month
The Scot has returned to form and is taking momentum into this year’s World Championship
Before his win in China, it had been four years without a professional title for Higgins
The Scot’s participation in this year’s world championship was thrown into doubt. Days before the tournament, his father-in-law suffered a heart attack. Thankfully, he is now at home recovering.
Higgins had limited time to prepare for a tough first-round clash with Joe O’Connor. In a war of attrition, the Scot prevailed 10-7 in a tense affair and Higgins admitted he was ‘drained’ afterwards. With a tricky first-round tie out the way, the Scot will be hoping to kick on. He plays world No 14 Xiao Guodong in round two.
The Crucible Theatre has penned plenty of fairytales. Ronnie O’Sullivan and Stephen Hendry winning seven world championships and Dennis Taylor’s victory over Steve Davis on the black ball in the deciding frame from 1985 are all etched in the mind of every fan no matter what age.
Higgins winning a fifth world title — 14 years after his fourth — and becoming the oldest world championship winner ever? It would be quite the tale in what has been, and still is, an incredible career. It would merit a place in snooker folklore.
His confidence was low at the turn of the year and the first-round defeat to Robertson looked destined to hasten what appeared to be the final chapter in Higgins’ career. Before winning the World Open in China last month, Higgins had gone four years without a professional World Snooker Tour title.
His defeat of O’Connor in Yushan lit a fire under the Scot. It ended a lengthy wait for a trophy and stopped a rot of five successive defeats in finals – three of them in a last-frame shoot-out.
The Tour Championship is the last event in the calendar before the worlds and Higgins claimed that title, too. He declared it as ‘the best win of his career.’ No wonder given the circumstances.
Higgins had experience on his side as he defeated O’Connor 10-6 in China, breaking the record for being the oldest player to win a professional tournament since Ray Reardon in 1982.
The Wizard of Wishaw with old rival Selby before their Tour Championship showdown
It would not be so simple against a fellow four-time world champion in Mark Selby. The final in Manchester just over a fortnight ago was a topsy-turvy affair.
Higgins flew out the traps and charged into a 5-1 lead in the race to ten frames. The Englishman flipped the script and turned that deficit into an 8-5 lead. The scars of old were looming large again but Higgins dug deep to win the last five frames and take a high-quality final 10-8 where eight centuries were made, four by each player.
This was a vintage performance that showed every characteristic in Higgins’ 33-year long professional career. A masterclass in break-building, solid safety play and a will to win that was simply unrivalled in his pomp. There were no weaknesses, not this time.
‘It’s my best win ever,’ said Higgins, who boasts 33 professional career wins and nine Triple Crown titles. ‘You are playing a monster of a player and to be 5-1 up then 8-5 down, you don’t come back and win five in a row against Selby normally. I managed to do it, so it’s incredible.’
Selby noted: ‘He (Higgins) is incredible and that’s why he’s an all-time great. The way he played from 8-5… I put it to him and he stood up like the warrior he is.’
Higgins is a rejuvenated character and, in the main draw in Sheffield, he’s the last Scot standing before the tournament has even begun. Stephen Maguire, Scott Donaldson and Ross Muir all failed to qualify, while young Liam Graham also failed to emerge from the gruelling qualification process but is one to watch in future.
Higgins parades his first world title at the home of his beloved Celtic back in 1998
The last time Scotland had just one player in the main draw was 1990. That was Stephen Hendry. He won the tournament, which was the first of his seven world titles, and was the third seed. A positive omen if ever there was one.
It’s been 14 years since Higgins prevailed at the Crucible. En route to that fourth world title, he was infamously heckled in the 2011 semi-final against Mark Williams by a member of the crowd over alleged match-fixing. When leading 14-13 and at the table in the semi-final, someone yelled: ‘How did you swallow 300,000, John?’
Higgins was fined £75,000 and given a six-month ban for bringing the game into disrepute and failing to tell authorities he was approached to breach betting rules when caught in a newspaper sting in Ukraine in 2010. In Kyiv, Higgins and his then-manager were filmed appearing to agree a fee of £300,000 to lose specific frames.
His manager was suspended for life. Higgins was cleared of match-fixing and vowed to restore his reputation but the fact he was world No 1 at the time of the incident was a sorry episode for a sport that’s had plenty of alleged match-fixing problems. Higgins was, by a long way, the most high-profile player to be wrapped up in it all.
That incident will always haunt him but there’s no denying his status as an all-time great, His longevity and mental toughness at the top table along with the other two members of the ‘Class Of 92’ in O’Sullivan and Williams is nothing short of remarkable.
Now that he’s rediscovered the art of winning, Higgins has a huge chance of becoming a five-time world champion.
Whether, at the age of 49 and a month before his 50th birthday, he has the staying power to get over the line is questionable but it would be foolish to write an in-form Higgins off.
‘The Wizard of Wishaw’ could cast his spell over The Crucible once again.
