Kyren Wilson suffered a 4-1 defeat to Liam Highfield in the last 32 of the 2026 British Open – exacerbating his current woes in ranking events.
Highfield produced a fine performance late on Wednesday that included breaks of 120, 89, and 56 to see off the Warrior and reach the last 16 at the Centaur in Cheltenham.
It takes Highfield to within one victory of matching his previous best run of a quarter-final spot in the ranking event.
For Wilson, however, the loss represents another early exit from a competition on the calendar.
After winning the 2024 World Championship, Wilson enjoyed a terrific 2024/25 campaign by adding a further four ranking titles to his collection of ten.
The Kettering cueist rose to number two in the world rankings and was within striking distance of joining the exclusive club of world numbers ones in the sport.
But since enduring the Curse of the Crucible with a first-round World Championship defeat to Lei Peifan in 2025, results in ranking events have been on a downward spiral.
Oddly, Wilson has still conjured some excellent performances in invitational events – notably winning both last season’s Shanghai Masters in China and the prestigious Masters at the Alexandra Palace.
This season, the 34 year-old orchestrated a strong defence of his Shanghai crown by reaching the final only to be denied by Judd Trump.
Yet sustained challenges in ranking events have been almost non-existent, with just three appearances at the quarter-final stage last term and none so far this season.
Things had briefly looked more positive when he ousted world champion Wu Yize in the previous round in Cheltenham, but Highfield put a stop to any aspirations of a deeper run.
Because Wilson’s 2024/25 stretch was so strong on the back of his success in Sheffield, he is in the midst of defending a lot of points on the rolling two-year standings.
That has already resulted in his dramatic drop down the pecking order from second toward the end of last season to his current standing of eighth.
A significant portion of his ranking points will come off in the second half of this season, meaning his automatic spot at the UK Championship later this year looks secure.
Wilson will also be guaranteed a berth at the Masters in 2027 as the tournament’s reigning champion.
However, there could be trouble beyond that if he can’t transform his output in ranking events.
Provisional 2027 World Championship Rankings
| Provisional Seeding | Provisional Ranking Points | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wu Yize (def. champ) | £898,300 |
| 2 | Zhao Xintong | £1,249,550 |
| 3 | Neil Robertson | £785,500 |
| 4 | Mark Selby | £762,350 |
| 5 | Shaun Murphy | £694,900 |
| 6 | Mark J Williams | £619,800 |
| 7 | Judd Trump | £590,350 |
| 8 | Ronnie O’Sullivan | £504,750 |
| 9 | John Higgins | £455,600 |
| 10 | Chris Wakelin | £409,800 |
| 11 | Mark Allen | £409,350 |
| 12 | Barry Hawkins | £383,800 |
| 13 | Xiao Guodong | £353,400 |
| 14 | Chang Bingyu | £348,400 |
| 15 | Zhou Yuelong | £307,200 |
| 16 | Thepchaiya Un-Nooh | £302,350 |
| — | — | — |
| 17 | Jack Lisowski | £266,900 |
| 18 | Zhang Anda | £262,400 |
| 19 | Elliot Slessor | £256,050 |
| 20 | Gary Wilson | £249,050 |
| 21 | Stuart Bingham | £217,550 |
| 22 | Si Jiahui | £214,200 |
| 23 | Ali Carter | £211,000 |
| 24 | Kyren Wilson | £204,300 |
| 25 | Noppon Saengkham | £202,500 |
| 26 | Hossein Vafaei | £191,050 |
| 27 | Pang Junxu | £187,750 |
| 28 | Ding Junhui | £180,850 |
Perhaps of primary concern is Wilson’s automatic ticket back to the Crucible Theatre for the 2027 edition of the World Snooker Championship.
On the provisional Race to the Crucible rankings, Wilson is way down in 24th position and about £100,000 adrift of Thepchaiya Un-Nooh in 16th place.
Earlier at the British Open, Wilson attributed his indifferent run of form to a lack of confidence with his cue.
“Poor, really poor,” Wilson told host broadcaster 5 after his 4-1 triumph over Florian Nuessle. “[I’m] just still struggling [with] using a new cue. Just trying to still adapt to the throw.”
“My new cue is still a lot thicker than what I was using before, so anything with side I’m completely guessing.
“It’s not nice, but I’m still trying. I’m giving it my all and obviously I’ve done well to come through.
“I started using it two days before the Shanghai Masters. I got to the final in Shanghai, so it’s a bit baffling.
“I thought the conditions were really good out there, and I made them look really bad. That is a bit of a head-scratcher.
“It’s just frustrating, because I feel like I’m working hard – I’m really motivated. I want to get back to where I think I belong.
“It’s just not quite coming out. Maybe I’m putting too much pressure on myself, I don’t know.”
Another esteemed player who is struggling on this front is Ding Junhui, whose provisional Race to the Crucible ranking is way down at number 28.
The 15-time ranking event winner similarly boasts just a couple of quarter-final runs from the last year or so and lost to Iulian Boiko at the 2026 British Open on Wednesday.
Wilson and Ding will next have an opportunity to turn things around at the upcoming English Open (Sept 7-13) in Brentwood.
They’ll meet Mateusz Baronowski and Michael Holt respectively in the first round.
Featured photo credit: WST
I know Highfield regularly goes deep into WC qualifying, so he’s a capable player.
On another note, Bai Yulu was behind 2-3 to Ross Muir, but won the 6th frame to force a deciding 7th — she potted a red to get in first, then made a decent break of 59, but couldn’t finish Muir off — at that point I was a little concerned, because I was rooting for her — sure enough, Muir ultimately won the 7th.
To her credit, she bounced back after losing the very close and very long 1st frame, where there was a lengthy stalemate with a lot of safety play — losing a frame like that can be a bit demoralizing to even the mentally toughest players.
She hasn’t really pushed on since that memorable UK Championship run, which is a shame.
If it were possible, women would have say a good sixty girls that would make a vibrant women’s league. I would watch if available but we all know that is pie in the sky idea. In the grandest schemes, if the women stretched among say 30 countries, they would stand a chance to become an Olympic sport and thus have an opportunity to qualify for sport funding as long as they meet the snooker standard.
Now that Bai Yulu is out, I’ll switch my allegiance to Stan Moody, at least for today — and Stan (the man) it taking care of business: down 0 – 2 versus Zhang Anda (a good player), Stan has now won 3 frames in a row, and is up 3 – 2 — go Stan!
Personally, I think it would give the sport a boost if Stan Moody were to (finally) fulfill the potential many saw in him (and perhaps still see in him), and emerge as a consistent contender at ranking events.
Stan’s reward for coming from behind to win this afternoon is a match with John Higgins tonite.
Now that it’s obvious players may have to contest two matches in one day, even if they are ‘only’ best of 7, I have a better understanding of why O’Sullivan may have decided not to play.
I really think the Ross Muir – Bai Yulu match was a true heart breaker. She has a 59 break and still could not pull it off.
She has lost several deciding frames in the last year or so. Stunting her progress unfortunately.
Thanks Dave, I have a question regarding snookers on colours. Is there a limit of misses before the frame is called? Is there a difference between snookers on red balls to colour balls?
Thank you Sir. Have a good day.
Same rules apply for snookers on reds and colours, except for the penalty points differing when involving the blue, pink, or black balls. The frame can be called if the three-miss rule comes into effect (miss the object ball three times in a row when not snookered and able to see it fully) and when a foul is committed on the final black (unless that foul leads to a respot).
It took 40 minutes for the world number 1 to win 4-0 with 3 centuries no less. That is basically the time it takes Higgins to win one frame. His game started an hour before Xintong’s and he is still playing a rookie who has never made to the last 16 in a ranking tournament,
Having watched snooker for some time, I’ve seen that some frames are just a lot more difficult to win than others, including for the most skillful players — this is especially true when you’re also trying not to lose — it largely depends on how the balls are scattered around the table.
And actually perhaps some frames ought to be longer.
I know I mentioned several times how I saw a player lose a frame, even a match-deciding frame, by taking on a risky shot and missing, leaving his opponent a good chance, when a professional safety would’ve been the much better shot to play.
More tour players need to choose a professional safety in those situations — if you’re playing in your local club, naturally you’ll go for the risky shot.
Stuttering stuff from the warrior. Personally I think he is someone who has a high maintenance mentality. Until his mind is running smoothly about life and his game, his snooker play won’t be dominating many quality opponents. He’s a blast from the past in his style of smashing open the bunch, so I like to see him playing his brand of suddenly old fashioned snooker, amongst all the players who mostly seem to have converged on playing “Ray Reardon snooker”(nudge the reds out gradually with flicks whilst remaining staunchly close to the black spot with the cue ball.) to a stupendously high standard.
Soon you may be writing a similar article about Neil Robertson: he just lost in the 1st round of the English Open (to a player I’ve never heard of).
Wilson may be feeling a little desperate — in only the 2nd frame (best of 7, Wilson was head 1 – 0) of his match against Chang Bingyu in the English Open, he was playing on needing 3 snookers with only 22 points left on the table — maybe he was just trying to annoy his opponent (Wilson eventually lost the frame).