Shaun Murphy has never forgiven Ronnie O’Sullivan for an incident over 30 years ago, saying the Rocket ‘verbally abused’ him when he was 12 years old.
Murphy and O’Sullivan known each other since the 1990s, with the Rocket bursting onto the scene early in the decade and the Magician first turning professional just before the turn of the millennium.
They have not always seen eye-to-eye and Murphy says their relationship was soured very early on.
The 43-year-old recalls something that happened over three decades ago, and while his respect for O’Sullivan as a snooker player is undiminished, he has never forgiven him for something he said all those years ago.
Speaking to David Hendon for his book Pots of Gold: A History of Snooker, Murphy said: ‘We fell out when I was young.
‘Ronnie verbally abused me when I was twelve and I never forgave him. I vividly remember it.
‘I still have immense respect for his levels of play as a snooker player. I watch in awe at the things he’s able to do, because I know how hard it is. His ability as a player is completely unmatched.’
Any further details were not unveiled, but Murphy has gone on to remain disappointed with the man six years his senior.
The Magician feels the seven-time world champion and the sport’s most popular and recognisable figure has not done enough to promote snooker as an ambassador.
Murphy suggests the Rocket has had preferential treatment due to his status in the game, but not used that platform to expand snooker.
‘He’s the biggest needle-mover in the sport, the biggest we’ve ever seen,’ said the 2005 world champion. ‘That brings you some forgiveness. When the golden goose lays the golden egg, you get treated differently.
‘There’s no question over the years that various chairmen have treated him more leniently over his offences because of the attention he brings to snooker, and commercially that’s probably correct.
‘But one of the reasons I idolised Steve Davis so much was I was brought up in a world where being the greatest meant a lot more than how good you were at playing snooker, and unfortunately, for all of the good things Ronnie has done in terms of his snooker ability, I think he’s done an equal amount of, if not more, damage to the sport from an ambassadorial point of view.
‘I think it’s such a shame that he hasn’t done for snooker in his ambassadorial position the things that people he says he looks up to – like Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic – have done, that he hasn’t taken a leaf out of their book and treated the sport that’s given him so much the same level of respect.
‘If he had used his platform for good, he could have single-handedly dragged snooker into a different stratosphere in terms of popularity. He could have made us much more mainstream.’
Murphy and O’Sullivan have not met much on the table in recent years, playing just once since 2019 when the Rocket triumphed 6-2 over the Magician in a 2024 Masters semi-final.
O’Sullivan went on to lift the trophy at Alexandra Palace and that took the Rocket’s Triple Crown tally to 23, with eight Masters, eight UK Championships and seven world titles.
‘When you just look at the numbers in that question. He needs a world title to make it 8-8-8, it’s ridiculous,’ Murphy said on the onefoursevenpodcast earlier this year.
‘I’ve worked my nuts off to win my four and he’s got 23. It’s obscene.’