John Higgins (snooker player) title, which prompted Steve Davis to comment "I think John Higgins is the best snooker player I've ever seen in my life". Despite the victory, Higgins lost the world number one ranking to Mark Williams. Higgins had a poor 2011/2012 season, reaching only two quarter finals of major ranking events. His season-best performance was reaching the semi-finals of the Masters, where he lost 4–6 to Shaun Murphy. Before the start of his World Championship title defence, he admitted that his performance levels had not been good enough and that he had not been trying hard enough, managing just one or
1999 UK Championship (snooker) 1999 UK Championship (snooker) The 1999 Liverpool Victoria UK Championship was a professional ranking snooker tournament that took place at the Bournemouth International Centre in Bournemouth, England. The event started on 13 November 1999 and the televised stages were shown on BBC between 20 and 28 November 1999. Stephen Hendry became the first player to make two maximum break in the tournament's history after scoring a 147 against Paul Wykes in the last 16. In the final Mark Williams defeated Matthew Stevens 10–8. This was Stevens' second consecutive final at the event. Defending champion John Higgins was the number 1