Ronnie O’Sullivan has suggested he has only three years left in snooker before retiring from the sport.
The 48-year-old has endured a difficult start to the 2024/25 season and is yet to reach a final. He pulled out of the recent British and Wuhan Opens citing medical reasons.
O’Sullivan has not played since being dumped out of the English Open in the first round in a result he called “embarrassing”, saying: “I’m absolutely useless. Forget about the Worlds. I’m not even bothered to be honest with you, if I’m going to play rubbish I might as well play left-handed. Play left-handed and enjoy it, but be useless, or play right-handed, be useless and not enjoy it.”
He won his seventh world title in 2022, and says he can still compete with the best if he fully commits himself to the sport.
“I think I’ve got maybe, if I want it, three really good years,” O’Sullivan told BBC Radio 4. “That depends on if I’m fully devoted to it and I’m kind of like ‘snooker is all I’m going to do for the next three years’. Which I can do.
“But it’s really hard to do when I’m sort of like: ‘I want to do a few days with Jimmy White as a pundit, I want to go and do a few exhibitions, I want to do a few shows,’ because they’re fun.
“I can still perform, I can still be a top eight player doing that but to fully give yourself the best opportunities it’s about being totally on it, you know. It’s whether I’m prepared to do that.”
O’Sullivan said he will throw everything at the upcoming season, with last year’s disappointing Crucible exit to Stuart Bingham in the quarter-finals.
“I think I will [fully commit] this year, I think I’ve decided. Last year, the World Championships wasn’t a good tournament for me. I was really gutted at how I played. Wasn’t disappointed I lost, you know, you lose. But the way I played, I wasn’t happy with that.
“I want to try and put that right and come back a different player next year.”