Watch: Miss of the decade on the final black! Snooker WC semi-final ends in tragedy

This year's Snooker World Championship will live in the memory of fans for a long time. Matches like Higgins vs O'Sullivan, Higgins vs Murphy, Wu vs Selby among many others have kept us on the edge of our seats without pause. However the second semi-final between Mark Allen and Wu Yize will be the match of the tournament that will live in infamy.

The 17-16 scoreline alone should tell you that we're talking about one of the greatest semi-finals in recent memory, but the frame that decided the match wasn't even the decider. This was due to the tragedy we witnessed in frame 32, for which words alone cannot do justice.

Mark Allen held a small but vital 16-15 lead in frames, when he failed to pot a straight red from only a slightly tricky angle in a position where he could close things out from a 62-52 advantage. By some miracle Wu didn't capitalize on this first mistake, failing to clear the colours after leaving himself with a tricky pink.

With just pink and black on the table, Allen needed both to secure his spot in the final. Moments later the Crucible erupted after a long pink pot by Allen saw the white roll perfectly into position for the black, which sat on its spot, waiting to be potted and grant the Northern Irishman his date with Shaun Murphy.

The Sheffield crowd barely fell silent before the shot, such was the sureness that the match was already over. But it wasn't. The black needed to be potted first. And it was potted - by Wu - after perhaps the miss of the decade, with the black ball rattling off the jaws from Allen's attempt but not far enough to be a challenge for Wu.

Allen could only look to the heavens for answers, as the crowd was dumbstruck between a mixture of shock, laughter and sighs. The game went to the decider, but no one can blame Allen for not gathering himself for it, such was the impact of a moment that will go down in history and be replayed time and time again.

The Snooker World Championship final will see Wu Yize at just 22 years of age enter the Crucible after never even winning there before this year. But it really should have been Mark Allen, and only time will tell how he manages to recover - probably not by watching the final, starting tomorrow at 1pm.

You can watch the action of the snooker year's most tragic frame from the video below.





Source: WST