December 15, 2001	Saturday	Ramazan 29, 1422

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YORK, Dec 14: Ronnie O’Sullivan produced his most dazzling snooker to complete the greatest comeback of his career, beating Peter Ebdon 9-8 from 8-4 down in the quarterfinals of the UK Championship in York Thursday.

The world champion showed both sides of his enigmatic character — reckless and frustrated in the first session but awe-inspiring in the second as he kept his hopes of a third UK title alive in spectacular fashion.

He also gained a measure of revenge for the two matches he has lost to Northamptonshire’s Ebdon this season — in the Champions Cup and LG Cup.

O’Sullivan took the first frame of the evening session to reduce his arrears to 6-3 with a run of 77. He was first in the balls in the next but missed a red to the corner and world No 7 Ebdon took it with a 69.

A run of 70 gave the Essex man the 11th but he looked dead and buried after losing the 12th when he missed a risky brown to the centre and Ebdon made a decisive 55 to make it 8-4.

Back came the Rocket with lightning runs of 74 and 70 to put pressure on Ebdon, who missed two straight-forward reds with the winning line in sight. Runs of 47 and 30 from O’Sullivan made it 8-7 and a typically fluent 73 forced the decider.

Ebdon was first to score as he blasted the cue ball into the pack of reds and fluked one, but he couldn’t make a decisive contribution. He played a poor safety to let O’Sullivan in with a mid-range red, and the world No 2 showed his class with a brilliant 85.

O’Sullivan will now play world No 1 Mark Williams in the semifinal on Saturday.

World No 1 Mark Williams reeled off a famous five frames to beat Stephen Hendry 9-8 on a night of high drama.

Williams, who came from 9-6 down to defeat Hendry 10-9 on a re-spotted black in the final of the 1998 Benson and Hedges Masters, produced an even more unlikely fightback on this occasion.

The pair have been involved in some epic battles over the years and tonight’s match was right up there with the best.

Seven-times world champion Hendry looked right back to his best after winning the European Open in Malta earlier this month.

That was his first world ranking title for 27 months and the 32-year-old Scot came to York with high hopes of claiming his sixth UK crown and equalling Steve Davis’s record of 73 tournament victories.

When he won the first four frames of the final session — the 12th after a titanic battled on the black — to go 8-4 up, a semi-final place looked a formality.

He finally managed to stop the rot with a run of 40 in the 13th frame after Hendry had missed a red to the top left-hand pocket and a break of 81 then cut the deficit to 8-6.

When Hendry missed the brown to hand Williams the 15th frame, it was game on again. With the tension mounting, Hendry had another chance to close the match out in frame 16. He potted the blue only to see the white drop into the left-hand centre pocket and all of a sudden it was 8-8.

Hendry was first to score in the decider but by now the momentum was with Williams and when his opponent missed a long red to the bottom right-hand pocket he seized his chance. A break of 83 — his highest of the match — completed the comeback.

“To beat anyone from 8-4 down is a marvellous achievement but especially Stephen Hendry when he has been playing so well,” said Williams, who beat fellow Welshman Matthew Stevens 10-8 in the 1999 UK Championship final. “I don’t think anyone has done that to win a match against him before.

“I thought I was very unlucky to be 8-4 behind. I said to Dennis Taylor during the interval that I was playing well enough and I had every chance of coming back into the match. I knew it was going to be tough but I also knew it wasn’t impossible.

“Stephen gave me a few chances, I scored well and when I got back to 8-6 he started to miss a few. I could see the pressure was building on him, which was only to be expected.

“If I had been 8-4 down in the last few tournaments I would probably have given up because I knew I wasn’t playing well enough to come back. Tonight was different and I was delighted to win it in one visit at the end.”

Hendry said: “I had lots of chances to win the match — probably the best in the 13th frame to win 9-4 — but at the end of the day I didn’t take them so I don’t deserve to be in the semifinals and Mark does.”

Quarterfinals results:

Stephen Lee (England) bt John Higgins (Scotland) 9-2; Ken Doherty (Republic of Ireland) bt Matthew Stevens (Wales) 9-7; Mark Williams (Wal) bt Stephen Hendry (Scot) 9-8; Ronnie O’Sullivan (Eng) bt Peter Ebdon (Eng) 9-8