John Higgins will cue up for the 2,000th time in a World Snooker Tour match when he plays at the 2026 World Open on Tuesday.
The legendary Scot will become the first player to reach the staggering landmark when he faces Stan Moody in the round of 64 in Yushan.
Higgins has been a professional on the main tour since 1992, spending the majority of his career ranked inside the world’s top 16 as one of the sport’s best competitors.
The 50 year-old is the reigning World Open champion and has accumulated 33 ranking crowns in total, placing him third on the all-time winners’ list.
Of his previous 1,999 games, Higgins has emerged as the victor on 1,387 occasions according to reputed stats website CueTracker.
That represents a success rate of just shy of 70 per cent, and Higgins continues to defy his age to challenge for major honours on the calendar.
The four-time world champion hasn’t quite been able to etch his name onto a trophy during the 2025/26 campaign, but he was a finalist at the International Championship, the Masters, and the Players Championship.
Indeed, Higgins is one of this week’s favourites with odds of 9/1 at most betting sites in the outright market for the ongoing 2026 World Open.
Higgins’ career trajectory has run alongside his peers Ronnie O’Sullivan and Mark Williams, who both also graduated to pro status from the Class of ’92.
But O’Sullivan and Williams are nowhere near Higgins when it comes to total matches played across their respective careers.
Williams does rank in second with the Welshman set to reach his own milestone of 1,900 games when he takes on Ricky Walden on Tuesday.
O’Sullivan, who frequently skips tournaments on the calendar, is down in seventh in the all-time standings with 1,577 total matches played.
The Rocket, though, does boast the most impressive success rate, winning an incredible 74.32 per cent of the encounters he has contested.
Most Matches Played in Snooker
March 17th, 2026
1. John Higgins – 2,000
2. Mark Williams – 1,900
3. Mark Selby – 1,708
4. Jimmy White – 1,643
5. Stuart Bingham – 1,604
6. Judd Trump – 1,586
7. Ronnie O’Sullivan – 1,577
8. Shaun Murphy – 1,476
9. Steve Davis – 1,462
10. Barry Hawkins – 1,438
Source: CueTracker
What it all does point to, if anybody needed convincing, is the remarkable longevity that Higgins and his two fiercest rivals have experienced in the sport.
All three continue to dominate a lot of categories in the record books, with O’Sullivan representing the most prolific champion at the Triple Crown events and Williams becoming the oldest ranking event champion with his glory at the Xi’an Grand Prix earlier this term.
The trio look set to qualify for the upcoming Tour Championship in Manchester where only the top 12 from the one-year rankings are invited to participate.
Beyond that, it wouldn’t be a huge surprise to see any one of Higgins, O’Sullivan, or Williams challenge for the game’s blue-riband title when the World Snooker Championship returns to the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield next month.
Featured photo credit: WST
Yet another milestone. Remarkable stuff for Higgins and his peers.
Higgins is infamous maybe, you watch the tape. If only he wasn’t caught, he be retired by now. His comment recently about not understanding why Judd Trump is not the GOAT. Ask the fans, the GOAT would never ever be winning 3-1 and up 70 points to 0 and then go ahead and play multiple safeties against an amateur no less. Just happened in the World Open. But what the hell do I know. Viva Sportsmanship
Current World Open champ goes home early edged out by Stan Moody 5-4.
Would be interesting to see how close O’Sullivan would be to Higgins if he’d not missed so many events, especially since 2012.
The best I’ve seen Higgins play was his 9-2 victory over O’Sullivan in the 2005 Grand Prix final. He became the first player ever to compile four successive centuries in a match.
Hello every one, I just wanted to rebuff my friend Jay with the simple fact that the GOAT won 7 World Championship Titles… 8 Masters Titles…… 8 UK Championships including winning 8 more ranking titles than John Higgins. He did all that playing 433 less matches! I always enjoy Jay’s comments to my messages, I am learning so much in a very short time.
Goodnight
I’m not sure what you’re getting at by declaring that Ronnie O’Sullivan is the GOAT, an opinion I agree with.