Ronnie O’Sullivan described his withdrawal from the Masters as a ‘nightmare decision to make’ and said it was down to a build-up of pressure ahead of the tournament.
The Rocket pulled out of the defence of his Masters title on Friday after, with Neil Robertson replacing him in the draw and taking on John Higgins on Sunday.
The 49-year-old had been playing in the Championship League on Wednesday and Thursday, appearing very frustrated with his game, so much so that he snapped his cue after a defeat to Robert Milkins.
After pulling out of the event in Leicester, O’Sullivan then withdrew from the Masters, having ‘lost the plot’ and left his cue in pieces in a bin.
There was concern for O’Sullivan’s mental health after the withdrawal and asked on Eurosport how he is on Monday evening, he said: ‘I’m alright, not too bad.’
Explaining his choice to pull out of the Masters, he said: ‘It was a nightmare decision really to make, if you’d have asked me Sunday if I was ready to play I’d probably have been ok to play. But it’s such a massive tournament.
‘I’d been on a three-week trip away playing and I just think I exhausted myself, a lot of pressure while I was away. The build-up of all that just got a bit too much really.
‘I lost the plot on Thursday, snapped my cue, so that’s unplayable, so I knew at that moment in time the right decision was to not play and such a big tournament that I thought whoever was to come in should have had at least a couple of days notice.’
On the fate of the cue, which he has been playing with for a number of years, he added: ‘It was in the bin, one of them wheelie bins, but my mate said we can’t leave that here, so he got it out and brought it with us.
‘I’ve got a couple of other cues that I can start practicing with because there’s some tournaments coming up. I’m going to continue to play so I need to get used to the cue now.’
Those words will be encouraging for O’Sullivan fans as he clearly hopes to get back to the table soon, and indeed he wants to win the Masters again.
‘This is an unbelievable tournament, top 16, best players in the world, amazing crowd, I’ve won this tournament many times, been in 14 finals,’ he said. ‘I’d love to come here and play again and hopefully be lucky enough to win the trophy again, that would be great.’
The three-week trip O’Sullivan mentioned saw him play in the Riyadh Season Snooker Championship, followed by exhibitions in Macau and mainland China before returning to the UK in early January.
In O’Sullivan’s place at the Masters, Robertson stepped in and beat Higgins 6-5 in a memorable match on Sunday afternoon, bouncing back from 5-1 down to edge out the Scot.
When O’Sullivan will next be in action is not clear, with the German Masters coming up later this month but the event in Berlin not usually one he plays in.
The World Open in China follows in February and the Rocket may choose to return to tournament action there.
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