2005 Masters (snooker)

Rileys Club Masters

Tournament information
Dates	13–20 February 2005
Venue	Wembley Conference Centre
City	London
Country	England
Organisation(s)	WPBSA
Format	Non-ranking event
Winner's share	£125,000
Highest break	141
Final
Champion	Ronnie O'Sullivan
Runner-up	John Higgins
Score	10–3
← 2004 2006 →

The 2005 Rileys Club Masters was a professional non-ranking snooker tournament that took place between 13 and 20 February 2005 at the Wembley Conference Centre in London, England.

Ronnie O'Sullivan won his second Masters title beating John Higgins, whom he also beat during O'Sullivan's other title win in 1995, 10–3. Not since Steve Davis whitewashed Mike Hallett 9–0 in 1988 had there been such a runaway London final.

Davis meanwhile defeated defending champion Paul Hunter 6–5, before losing to Peter Ebdon in the quarter-finals. Another veteran, Jimmy White, who had recently signed a madcap sponsorship deal with HP Sauce (which had sponsored the brown ball in the game) and renaming himself as 'James Brown' (but the new name was never mentioned by referees or commentators during the tournament), made it to the semi-finals again and played against O'Sullivan, but lost 1–6.

After not having a sponsor the previous year, Riley's Club stepped in for the 2005 event. For the first time since the 1989/1990 season there was no qualifying event for the Masters.^[1]

Field

Defending champion Paul Hunter was the number 1 seed with World Champion Ronnie O'Sullivan seeded 2. Places were allocated to the top 16 players in the world rankings. Players seeded 15 and 16 played in the wild-card round against the two wild-card selections, Stephen Maguire (ranked 24) and Ding Junhui (ranked 76). Stephen Maguire had won the UK Championship the previous November and was making his debut in the Masters.

Prize fund

The breakdown of prize money for this year is shown below:^[2]

• Winner: £125,000
• Runner-up: £60,000
• Semi-final: £30,500
• Quarter-final: £15,000
• Last 16: £10,000
• Last 18: £2,000

• Highest break: £10,000
• Maximum break: £25,000

Wild-card round

^[3][4][5][6]

Match	Date		Score
WC1	Sunday 13 February	Graeme Dott (15)	6–4	Stephen Maguire
WC2	Monday 14 February	Marco Fu (16)	4–6	Ding Junhui

Main draw

^[3][4][5][6]

	Last 16 Best of 11 frames					Quarter-finals Best of 11 frames					Semi-finals Best of 11 frames					Final Best of 19 frames
	1	Paul Hunter	5
	13	Steve Davis	6
						13	Steve Davis	1
						8	Peter Ebdon	6
	8	Peter Ebdon	6
	14	David Gray	0
											8	Peter Ebdon	3
											5	John Higgins	6
	5	John Higgins	6
	12	Chris Small	1
						5	John Higgins	6
						4	Stephen Hendry	2
	4	Stephen Hendry	6
	9	Stephen Lee	1
																5	John Higgins	3
																2	Ronnie O'Sullivan	10
	3	Mark Williams	6
	10	Alan McManus	3
						3	Mark Williams	5
						11	Jimmy White	6
	6	Matthew Stevens	5
	11	Jimmy White	6
											11	Jimmy White	1
											2	Ronnie O'Sullivan	6
	7	Ken Doherty	1
		Ding Junhui	6
							Ding Junhui	2
						2	Ronnie O'Sullivan	6
	2	Ronnie O'Sullivan	6
	15	Graeme Dott	3

Final

Final: Best of 19 frames. Referee: Paul Collier. Wembley Conference Centre, London, England, 20 February 2005.[4]
John Higgins (5)  Scotland	3–10	Ronnie O'Sullivan (2)  England
Afternoon: 9–97 (95), 130–0 (54, 76), 61–7, 0–107 (107), 24–89 (58), 1–102 (97), 0–135 (102), 73–45 (53) Evening: 0–79 (79), 56–75 (56, 75), 0–79 (79), 1–88 (79), 0–134 (134)
76	Highest break	134
0	Century breaks	3
4	50+ breaks	10

Century breaks

^[3]

• 141, 111 Ding Junhui
• 134, 130, 123, 107, 105, 102 Ronnie O'Sullivan
• 116 Mark Williams
• 115, 109 Jimmy White
• 110, 108 Stephen Hendry
• 110, 106 Peter Ebdon
• 106, 101 John Higgins
• 101 Stephen Maguire
• 100 Marco Fu

References