If a snooker player can be judged on his last shot in competition then Ronnie O'Sullivan should be nowhere near his status as favourite for the World Championship starting on April 17.

The straight black he missed in losing to Tian Pengfei at the China Open on March 31 had to be seen to be believed, as he left the ball hanging over the pocket before conceding defeat to his opponent, a wild-card entrant.

Yet, O'Sullivan is the player at the shortest odds with most bookmakers for Crucible glory, and he remains "the man to beat" according to defending world champion John Higgins.

Ask him whether he sees himself triumphing for a fourth time and the answer is typical downbeat O'Sullivan.

"No, because I couldn't see me winning one to be honest with you," O'Sullivan said.

"I've done one, two, three, so I've superseded what I thought I was going to do in the game."

O'Sullivan was 17 when he first qualified for the World Championship, and at 34 he may be twice the age but he would contend he is far from twice the player. He stated earlier this year that he has "been playing like a plum for 17 years".

Performing like a soft fruit, however has brought him three world titles, four in the UK Championship and four at the Masters, and surely more significant success beckons, whatever O'Sullivan says.

Twelve months ago he had rolled up to the Crucible as defending champion but played nothing like it, losing to Mark Allen in the second round.

Clearly low on self-belief, O'Sullivan said that winning one match was actually an improvement on his pre-tournament expectations.

Already O'Sullivan has lost the number one ranking for next season to Higgins, and this week he offered his followers only scraps of positive talk ahead of the World Championship.

O'Sullivan held court in the exclusive RAC Club on Pall Mall, this time dressed more in keeping with the surroundings than he was 12 months previously when he flagrantly breached the dress code by showing up in jeans, leather jacket and T-shirt.

Looking ahead to Sheffield, he said: "I was well uncomfortable last year and I feel equally uncomfortable this year.

"Sometimes you have better years off the table, and this year I have enjoyed my year off the table, whereas last year I was trying too hard to get it right.

"Then this year I just thought, 'you know what, I'm not even going to try to get it right'. I thought to myself, 'I'll just pitch up, play, and if it's there it's there, and if it ain't, so what?'

"I don't mean 'so what', what I mean is if it ain't there, there's no point driving yourself mad about it.

"And that's the kind of way I've approached this year and that's the way I'll be approaching the World Championships, basically not expecting too much."

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.