Kyren Wilson became the latest player to fall to the Curse of the Crucible after losing at the 2025 World Snooker Championship on Saturday.
Those pesky snooker gods are an unforgiving bunch, and where they have taken absolutely no mercy is with returning maiden champions in Sheffield.
The curse professes that no first-time world champion at the Crucible has ever returned the following year to successfully defend the crown.
Every single world champion since the tournament moved to Sheffield in 1977 has succumbed to the voodoo.
Wilson, who beat Jak Jones to claim the title almost 12 months ago, was confident that he would be the player to snap the jinx.
Yet history tells us that, regardless of ranking and form, the Englishman’s chances were slim at best.
John Spencer, Ray Reardon, and Alex Higgins
Although not first-time world champions, John Spencer and Ray Reardon’s respective triumphs in 1977 and 1978 were their maiden victories at the Crucible Theatre.
Spencer, the first Crucible champion after the tournament moved to Sheffield, lost to Perrie Mans in the first round in 1978.
Reardon’s victory that year was his sixth world title overall albeit a first in Sheffield, but the Welshman was defeated by Dennis Taylor in the 1979 quarter-finals.
Most statisticians don’t count Spencer and Reardon as having surrendered to the voodoo, but perhaps it’s the defeats of these proven snooker champions where the dreaded curse actually originated from.
In 1983, Alex Higgins’ defence of his first Crucible crown ended at the semi-final stage with defeat to Steve Davis.
Terry Griffiths
Terry Griffiths was the original first-time world champion who failed to return to the Crucible Theatre the falling year and defend his title.
Famously a winner as a qualifier in 1979, Griffiths lost to Steve Davis in his first outing of the 1980 tournament at the last-16 stage.
Cliff Thorburn
In 1981, Cliff Thorburn was back having triumphed a year earlier at the expense of Alex Higgins in the final.
The Canadian performed admirably, reaching the semi-finals before being downed by rising star Steve Davis – the eventual champion that year.
Steve Davis
If anybody thought that Davis, a winning machine of the era, could muster up the strength to break the Curse of the Crucible, think again.
In fact, the Nugget carries the stigma of possessing the worst record as a returning champion and was thrashed 10-1 by a relentless Tony Knowles in the 1982 first round.
Dennis Taylor
Davis recovered in 1983 and 1984 to claim back-to-back titles and looked like making it a hat-trick before Dennis Taylor won that final in 1985.
The bespectacled Ulsterman was duly blinded by the jinx in 1986 when he lost 10-6 to Mike Hallett in the first round.
Joe Johnson
A 150/1 outsider, few predicted Joe Johnson winning a world title and probably even fewer thought that he would go so close to a repeat.
The Bradford potter is one of only two players to reach the final the next year, and Johnson’s 18-14 loss to Steve Davis means he has come the closest of anyone to breaking the Curse of the Crucible.
Stephen Hendry
Steve Davis rampaged for the rest of the 1980s until an even younger hotshot by the name of Stephen Hendry burst onto the scene.
Hendry may have the “King of the Crucible” moniker, but even royalty is fallible to the devilry of the curse, with Hendry relinquishing his 1990 title a year later in a quarter-final reverse against Steve James.
John Parrott
John Parrott took advantage of Hendry’s demise to win the 1991 title, but the Curse was so strong with the Liverpudlian that he could never get back to the single table setup again.
In 1992, Parrott lost at the quarter-final stage after a tight 13-12 loss to Alan McManus.
Ken Doherty
Irishman Ken Doherty delighted the snooker world in 1997 by ending Hendry’s five-year reign in Sheffield.
The Darlin’ of Dublin embarked on another run to the final in 1998 but couldn’t prevent another Scot from landing his maiden world trophy – losing 18-12 to John Higgins.
The Curse of the Crucible
In what round did the returning first-time world champions lose?
Final: Twice
Semi-Final: 3 times
Quarter-Final: 5 times
Last 16: 3 times
Last 32: 7 times
(Stat doesn’t include Spencer, Reardon, and A. Higgins)
John Higgins
The 1999 semi-final lineup was one for the ages, featuring top seed Higgins, his Class of ’92 contemporaries Ronnie O’Sullivan and Mark Williams, and the still formidable Hendry.
Williams was the one to deny Higgins in the last four, but the Welshman would have to wait a little longer to etch his own name onto the silverware as a magnificent seventh transpired for King Hendry.
Mark Williams
Williams bounced back from losing the 1999 final by claiming the 2000 title at the expense of countryman Matthew Stevens.
In 2001, he was among the favourites again but lost a second-round thriller to Joe Swail in a deciding frame.
Ronnie O’Sullivan
Even the great Ronnie O’Sullivan has fallen for the enchantment of the Crucible Curse.
After winning a long overdue maiden world title in 2001, O’Sullivan was downed in the 2002 semi-finals by long-term rival Hendry.
Peter Ebdon
In 2003, Peter Ebdon returned as the champion having denied Hendry an eighth success a year earlier in a dramatic deciding frame – the last World Championship final to require all 35 frames.
Despite entering the event out of form, Ebdon performed quite well during his defense and reached the quarter-finals where he was beaten 13-12 by Paul Hunter.
Shaun Murphy
Shaun Murphy became only the second qualifier to win at the Crucible with his triumph at the 2005 tournament.
Twelve months on, Murphy was denied at the quarter-final stage by, somewhat ironically, the last player to succumb to the Curse – Ebdon.
Graeme Dott
Like Murphy before him, Graeme Dott represented a surprise world champion in 2006.
The Scot proved more than capable of enjoying good runs in Sheffield, but one of those was not in the year of his defense, with Dott losing to Ian McCulloch in the 2007 opening round.
Neil Robertson
Neil Robertson beat Dott in 2010 to claim what has proven to be the Australian’s one and only world title to date.
Robertson relinquished the crown in the first round in 2011, losing to an up-and-coming young prodigy by the name of Judd Trump.
Mark Selby
Mark Selby won world titles in 2014, 2016, and 2017. We all know why he didn’t manage to emerge triumphantly in 2015, right?
Selby struggled past opening-round opponent Kurt Maflin but the Curse, taking the form of Anthony McGill, ended his hopes in the last 16.
Stuart Bingham
An emotional Stuart Bingham beat three former world champions and a future one during his memorable glory of 2015.
There were tears of despair a year later when the defending champion lost 10-9 to Ali Carter in the first round.
Judd Trump
Judd Trump dismantled the field to finally capture his first World Championship in 2019, and he was undoubtedly the player to beat in 2020.
Trump had won a record six ranking titles during the 2019/20 season, but proceedings at the Crucible were delayed as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic and Trump lost his winning touch in a quarter-final reverse to Kyren Wilson.
Luca Brecel
Luca Brecel was added to the list of names who have been bowled over by the Curse of the Crucible in 2024.
The Belgian Bullet’s loss to David Gilbert on the opening day of last year’s edition meant that the hex lived on.
Kyren Wilson
For all his pre-tournament talk that he would be the man to end that curse, world number two Wilson succumbed to it as early as round one in 2025.
The 2024 world champion led young Chinese competitor Lei Peifan 6-2 but lost seven frames on the bounce before eventually exiting in a deciding frame.
Featured photo credit: WST
When did the curse first become the inevitable headline news of the opening day? Back in the very early days in Sheffield, no one had defended any title at the Crucible, until Davis did in ’84, the idea of a ‘first-time champion curse’ seems to have been applied retrospectively.
When I started following snooker in the 90s, it was more of an obscure bit of trivia than the widely cited pressure point it is today. In that sense, it’s almost become a self-fulfilling prophecy—amplifying the pressure on players already adjusting to the changes that come with achieving everything they set out to achieve. That might explain why so many first-time winners not only struggle at the Crucible the following year, but also have underwhelming seasons overall.
Wilson, in that regard, has already joined some of the greats in breaking part of the pattern.