Profile of Anthony Hamilton

World ranking: 19
Last five seasons: 11-10-11-14-22
Date of birth: 29-06-71
Lives: Nottingham, Nottinghamshire
Turned professional: 1991
Best ranking event performance: Runner-up British Open 1999
Last season's prize money: £71,450
Career prize money (up to start of 2001-2002 season): £532,829
Highest tournament break: 145 - Embassy World Championship 1995

Anthony Hamilton's four-year run among snooker's elite top 16 came to an end following an injury-hit 2000-2001 season.

Nottingham-born Hamilton, dubbed the 'Robin Hood of Snooker', paid a heavy price for trying to stop the poor from robbing the rich.

He broke his wrist in an unsuccessful attempt to prevent a pickpocket stealing his friend's wallet and was forced to sit out the first two ranking tournaments of the season.

"I missed the British Open and the Grand Prix - and I'm never the quickest of starters in any case," he said. "It takes me one or two tournaments to find my feet. I then lost a couple of matches and that was almost the whole season gone.

"I wasn't thinking about my ranking at the start of the season but when I lost my first two matches I was right under pressure."

Hamilton was unable to make up the lost ground and although he beat Scotland's Marcus Campbell 10-4 in his opening match in the Embassy World Championship, he then lost 13-5 to Matthew Stevens and dropped eight places down the rankings to No 19.

He came mighty close to winning his first major title at the 1999 British Open in Plymouth, beating Marco Fu, Paul Hunter, Mark Williams, Stephen Hendry and Jimmy Michie before going down 9-7 to Fergal O'Brien in the final.

Hamilton, who has earned a reputation as a big break-builder, began the final with two centuries - 110 and 134 - but lost a number of close frames on the pink or black.

"Fergal potted all the pressure balls and deserved to win," he admitted. "But it was a great buzz and I've been waiting for that for eight years as a pro."

Hamilton secured his place among the elite top 16 without reaching the quarter-finals of a ranking event.

All that changed during the 1998-99 season when he reached the last eight of the German Open and Regal Welsh, then went one better in the Thailand Masters in Bangkok, where he eventually lost 5-4 to John Parrott.

Hamilton, winner of the Australian Open and Australian Masters - both non-ranking events - in 1995, reached the quarter-finals of the World Championship for the first time in 2000.

He defeated Hong Kong's Fu 10-4 and 1997 world champion Ken Doherty 13-12 before finding John Higgins too strong in the last eight, going down 13-3.

"This is the toughest of all venues," he said afterwards. "You arrive in good heart, still in contention and knowing you've done the practice. But, after 45 minutes out there, John Higgins knew he had won. He'd gone 7-3 in front and he could sense I was nowhere in sight. I wasn't competing."


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