This is one of the weird things I wonder on the run up to the Crucible. Everyone has an anorak in them that thinks about such pointless trivia. For example, I remember hearing that no player who is seeded sixth in the World Championship has won at the Crucible. Not sure if that is true or not but these are the sort of statistics we take pleasure in.
Yes, I am coping well in this lockdown thank you very much.
The Data
When the draw of the World Snooker Championship happens, all the qualifiers will be drawn against the sixteen seeded players. The draw is completely random. These draws are something that you cannot fix whatsoever. I think draws are really interesting and it’s amazing how certain seeds seem to get ‘easier’ draws. Do defending champions get harder draws at all?
I have gone back as far as the 2015 World Championship to 2019. This is mainly because the 2014/2015 was the first season where the tariffs are based on prize money in comparison to points awarded by the governing body. I have looked at all of the numbered seeds the Top 16 players have faced in the opening round of the Crucible during the 5-year period. I found out the opposition’s seedings according to Snooker.org.
Then, I collected the average of the seeded qualifiers against each particular seed from the Top 16. I have averaged all seeds participated in each World Championship as well.
The Table
Here is what I found:
| Crucible Seed | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | Average seed / Crucible seed |
| 12 | 21 | 17 | 59 | 30 | 21 | 29.6 |
| 14 | 18 | 32 | 51 | 17 | 32 | 30 |
| 1 | 38 | 31 | 45 | 22 | 29 | 33 |
| 10 | 58 | 19 | 29 | 37 | 24 | 33.4 |
| 3 | 19 | 30 | 42 | 25 | 66 | 36.4 |
| 16 | 32 | 29 | 44 | 64 | 18 | 37.4 |
| 6 | 69 | 22 | 18 | 56 | 35 | 40 |
| 7 | 20 | 74 | 32 | 34 | 43 | 40.6 |
| 5 | 31 | 18 | 63 | 58 | 38 | 41.6 |
| 8 | 68 | 20 | 30 | 51 | 39 | 41.6 |
| 4 | 40 | 28 | 37 | 55 | 52 | 42.4 |
| 13 | 24 | 24 | 48 | 27 | 91 | 42.8 |
| 15 | 35 | 59 | 24 | 21 | 80 | 43.8 |
| 11 | 42 | 71 | 39 | 68 | 19 | 47.8 |
| 2 | 80 | 21 | 54 | 18 | 129* | 60.4 |
| 9 | 97 | 57 | 72 | 52 | 28 | 61.2 |
| Average seed / year of WC | 43.25 | 34.50 | 42.94 | 39.69 | 46.50 |
The Results
From this table, it seems that whoever is ranked No. 12 and No. 14 in the world are more likely to get the highest ranked players. On the other hand, the seeds No. 9 and No. 2 tend to get the lower-ranked opponents. Remarkably, those who are ranked No. 5 and No. 9 have beaten their first-round opponents every time in the last five years. This somehow adds weight to how difficult it is to beat the Crucible Curse, if the defending champions seems to get harder draws.
You may be wondering they some numbers are highlighted in red. They represented the seeds who have beaten the Top 16 in their opening matches. This shows that three of the Top 16 seeds have suffered three opening losses within the past five years.
What The Data Doesn’t Say
The obvious point to put out is that these seeds don’t tell us the quality of these snooker players. Arguably, the quality has increased massively over the past number of years because of the increased number of tournaments and greater opportunities across the entire world.
For example, Thepchaiya Un-Nooh and Zhao Xintong were seeded No. 43 and No. 66 respectively in 2019. Un-Nooh was regarded as one of the qualifiers to avoid alongside Graeme Dott, Ali Carter and Joe Perry! Some also believe that amateur James Cahill is better than some of the snooker professionals during that time.
One thing this doesn’t tell us is which players receive the more favourable draws as well. One can look up individually which players have the poorest record of the World Championship.
Reflection
This is something I might do next time. Back in 2007, Ronnie O’Sullivan once claimed that the World Championship draw was fixed after being drawn against Ding Junhui, especially when he was drawn against first-round opponents Marco Fu and Stephen Maguire (twice) in previous years. O’Sullivan later withdrew the accusation. World Snooker maintained that the draw is 100% genuine and was presided by an independent auditor.
It would be interesting to find out whether lady luck favours some particular players more than others in the World Championship draws. We will have to see. It’s just fun with numbers at the end of the day.
