Ken Doherty

Kenneth Joseph Doherty (born 17 September 1969) is an Irish retired professional snooker player who also works as a commentator and pundit on televised snooker broadcasts. From Ranelagh in Dublin, he is the sport's only world champion from the Republic of Ireland, having won the title in 1997, and one of only seven players from outside the United Kingdom to have won the title in the modern era. He is the only player to have been world under-21, world amateur and world professional champion. After moving from Dublin to London to pursue his snooker career, Doherty won the World Under-21 Amateur Championship and the World Amateur Championship in 1989. He turned professional the following year and reached the first of his 17 ranking finals at the 1992 Grand Prix, losing 9–10 to Jimmy White. He won the first of his six ranking titles several months later at the 1993 Welsh Open, beating Alan McManus 9–7 in the final, which helped him enter the top 16 for the first time in the 1993–94 world rankings. At the 1997 World Snooker Championship, he ended Stephen Hendry's record 29-match winning streak at the Crucible with an 18–12 victory in the final. Doherty was runner-up at two other World Championships. As defending champion at the 1998 event, he had an opportunity to break the Crucible curse but lost the final 12–18 to John Higgins. Facing Mark Williams in the 2003 final, Doherty recovered from 2–10 behind to tie the scores at 11–11 but lost 16–18. In other Triple Crown events, he was UK Championship runner-up three times (losing 5–10 to Hendry in 1994, 1–10 to Ronnie O'Sullivan in 2001 and 9–10 to Williams in 2002), and Masters runner-up twice (losing 8–10 to Higgins in 1999 and by the same score to Matthew Stevens in...