RONNIE O’SULLIVAN believes old rival John Higgins has lost his ruthless streak.
The Rocket, 48, has been battling Scotland’s all-time great since their junior days.
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But four-time world champion Higgins is on the brink of dropping out of snooker’s top 16, which would end a proud, 29-year unbroken spell among the game’s elite players.
And seven-time Crucible winner O’Sullivan, who kicks off his English Open bid this week, said: “I’ve played against John since we were kids.
“When he’s on his game he’s unplayable. His safety’s just unbelievable, he scores well.
“But he’s not performing like he used to. We’re all the same.
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“Me, John and Mark Williams have probably made more mistakes in one tournament now than we used to make during a whole season.
“That’s the difference when you get older. We’ll get on a roll, but then we miss a few easy ones and hand the momentum back to our opponents.
“I watch my games now and think I’m useless. But I watch games from ten years ago and think, ‘I used to be a good player’.
“It’s just silly mistakes, you’re not as clinical as you used to be.
“These guys don’t care about what you’ve done in the past, they go out there fancying it and they are good enough to beat you.”
O’Sullivan starts his quest for the £100,000 top prize against He Guoqiang.
Veteran Higgins, 49, plays Andrew Higginson tomorrow night.
Fellow Scots Anthony McGill and Stephen Maguire both also get their tournaments underway in Brentwood on Tuesday.
The snooker legend revealed how he ended up in the ‘weirdest experience ever’ as he bought his gold dust ticket.
Hendry revealed: “I went to watch Mike Tyson, when he bit Evander Holyfield‘s ear. I was there.
“I was on holiday and I wasn’t planning to go. And then there was like ‘should we just go?’
“So we got into this with a ticket tout, which was the weirdest experience ever.
“I had to go into this shop and this guy was like ‘come into this corner of the shop.’
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“$1,000 a ticket for $200 seats. I thought it’d be decent seats but we were right up the back. We couldn’t see a thing.”
A fracas broke out in the ring after official Mills Lane DQd Tyson, who subsequently had an altercation with police officers INSIDE the squared circle.
In the 17,000-seater MGM Grand Arena, punters were incensed at how things played out with fans venting their anger as they made their way out.
Read more on the Scottish Sun
And Hendry recalls how he was left rather fearful as everything kicked off around him.
He added: “And then it all kicked-off when he did what he did. I was s******g myself because the crowds were just going mental.”
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