There is less than a week left until the start of the 2025 World Snooker Championship, so let’s look at the seeds in the main draw this year.
Each of the seeds will have aspirations of going all the way to glory in what is the 49th edition at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield.
On Saturday, we began this mini four-part series with those who are ranked from 13th to 16th before looking at the seeds from 9th to 12th in the draw yesterday.
Today, let’s focus our attention today on the seeds who are ranked from 5th to 8th in the field.
8th Seed: Mark Allen
Mark Allen began the 2024/25 season as snooker’s world number one, but the Northern Irishman has suffered a swift decline since.
While rarely reaching his normal high standard, the first half of the campaign before the turn of the year wasn’t all that bad.
A series of runs to the semi-finals of events was bettered by his success at the lucrative Riyadh Season Snooker Championship invitational in Saudi Arabia.
Things have taken a downward spiral in 2025, though, and Allen has experienced a string of early exits in events since reaching the last four of the Masters in January.
Allen has a disappointing record at the sport’s blue-riband event, only reaching the single table setup a couple of times.
Not many will be predicting a Crucible challenge from the Pistol in 2025, but going in under the radar might suit him on this occasion.
If he gets through his initial hurdle against one of the qualifiers, a mouthwatering second-round showdown with Neil Robertson could await.
World Championship best: Semi-Final (2009, 2023)
Best result in 2024/25: Champion (Riyadh Season Snooker Championship)
Form rating: 2.5/5
7th Seed: Luca Brecel
At one point during the first period of this season, it genuinely looked as though Luca Brecel might get dragged into a fight for tour survival.
Although still boasting an elevated ranking on the official list, Brecel’s end-of-season ranking looks set to plummet unless he can defend the monstrous ยฃ500,000 cheque that he claimed for winning the 2023 world crown.
The Belgian Bullet had been teetering just above the crucial top 64 mark on the provisional end-of-season rankings, but steadier results in recent months have quelled relegation fears.
Brecel reached the final of the Riyadh Season Snooker Championship in December, and although that run didn’t generate ranking points, it did give him a much-needed boost in confidence.
A couple of months later he followed it up with a semi-final showing at the Welsh Open, falling one win shy of an unlikely qualification for the World Grand Prix.
Such is his nonchalant approach to competing, it’s hard to know whether it’s a good or bad thing that he hasn’t played competitively since February.
But the 30 year-old should make the most of his opportunity to be one of the World Championship seeds this year, because there’s no guarantee when he’ll get to enjoy such a status again.
World Championship best: Champion (2023)
Best result in 2024/25: Runner-up (Riyadh Season Snooker Championship)
Form rating: 2/5
6th Seed: Mark Williams
Mark Williams turned 50 in March, so it’s remarkable that he and his two Class of 1992 contemporaries are still up there among the top six World Snooker Championship seeds.
A three-time world champion, Williams can’t be written off when it comes to a potential challenge in Sheffield.
Not aiding his cause, however, is a worrying deterioration of his eye sight recently that has wreaked havoc with his form.
Williams began the 2024/25 season strongly and came within a couple of balls of capturing the inaugural Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters in Riyadh.
A few months later, the Welshman outlasted an elite field to capture a maiden Champion of Champions title in Bolton.
But match victories have been few and farther between in 2025, and the former world number one has turned to trying contact lenses as a solution.
If he can get through his opening-round fixture, he could meet Barry Hawkins in the second round with a potential quarter-final date with old rival John Higgins to follow.
World Championship best: Champion (2000, 2003, 2018)
Best result in 2024/25: Champion (Champion of Champions)
Form rating: 2.5/5
5th Seed: Ronnie O’Sullivan
Will Ronnie O’Sullivan mount a challenge for a record-breaking eighth world title of the modern era? That is the question everybody is asking.
It would a huge disappointment for the tournament overall if the Rocket opts to skip this year’s World Championship.
But given his recent history of pulling out of events – and big ones at that – there’s every possibility that he could be a no-show in 2025.
Since losing to Barry Hawkins in the first round of the UK Championship in November, O’Sullivan has withdrawn from pretty much every event on the calendar.
That includes skipping the defence of his Masters title, which came a few days after he snapped his cue upon withdrawing midway through his Championship League group in Leicester.
Because he hasn’t been playing, O’Sullivan doesn’t boast any kind of form guide. But that doesn’t mean he can’t challenge again at the Crucible.
He proved that in 2013 when he took practically an entire season out only to successfully defend his world crown.
Love or loathe the guy, O’Sullivan remains the biggest box-office attraction this sport has to offer, and it would be a huge shame if he decides against being involved this year.
World Championship best: Champion (2001, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2013, 2020, 2022)
Best result in 2024/25: Semi-Final (Xi’an Grand Prix)
Form rating: 0/5
The series will conclude on Tuesday with a look at the top four World Snooker Championship seeds in the draw this year.
Featured photo credit: WST
It’s actually surprises me how going through the current top 16, one by one, and considering their recent form and results, you come to the realisation that when you look past the four outstanding players of the season: Trump, Wilson, Selby and Higgins; the rest of the top 16 is extremely gettable and beatable currently. It could be a fascinating tournament, an absolutely unpredictable first round… except that at least a couple of the “big four” of the season will go deep!
Ronnie O’Sullivan is the name on everyone’s lips however as we draw within a few days of kick off. I’d say that he won’t play considering that he is obviously badly out of sorts in some way. I’m not sure that the most gruelling tournament of them all, one which he sometimes didn’t seem to me to gel with in the mid phase of his career, will entice him back to the competition table.
Allen is now more suited to.tbe demands of the Crucible. We shouldn’t forget the last two Crucible winners hadn’t been in stellar form before triumphing.
Brecel has never won a match outside his victory year. He’s a dark horse for me as much prefers going under the radar and his game was trending nicely before the Player’s Series.
Williams looks to be the beat draw to get if he doesn’t adjust to the contact lenses. The volume of misses and by how much he missed balls in his last two event was immensely concerning.
Daniel makes a good point about this event being a strange one to return for if the mental health issues are deeper than we’re aware of. He needs a softer draw in round one so he can potentially develop some early belief that his new cue can deliver for him.