Since 1977,
the World Snooker Championship has been held in the city of Sheffield (England)
in the building of the theater with the telling name Crucible Theatre . On April 28, 2009, the Crucible
crowd cheered their King Stephen Hendry (10) and The Magician Shaun Murphy(3), who played a quarterfinal
match to 13 wins.
During his life
as snooker player , Hendry had several
nicknames: The Golden Boy ( 1985-1990),
The King of the Crucible (1991-2006), and The Ice Man ( 2007-2012). In the
seventh frame, after 16 hits, The King scored 64 points, playing only through the black . After the 8th black cue ball rolled an extra 10 cm, and you Stephen had to choose: a safety shot or a crooked triple plant. In this position, great pragmatists like Selby or Robertson would probably have chosen safety shot , because there were still 83 points on the table
But the great Scot, who is 40 years old, chose the attack and carried out this blow as if in training, without long rounds of the table and manipulations with the cue in search of a target point . In this game Hendry made his 9 out of 11 maximum break (15*8+27=147 points) and led the match 5-2.
He showed
again that he was still King of the Crucible. After the frame, Murphy warmly
congratulated his famous opponent.
Stephen nevertheless lost the entire match with a score of 11: 13. In the semifinals, Murphy
beat Roberson 17: 14, but in the final lost to Higgins (The Title holder of 1998,
2007, 2009, 2011 years) 9: 18.
For his
fantastic series, Hendry received a modest increase to his upcoming pension -
£140,000 (this is how much the maximum cost in 2009!) plus £10,000, - for the
best break.
