Ronnie O'Sullivan speaks out on Saudi Arabia snooker facilities after 'disgusting' UK venue criticism

Ronnie O'Sullivan has made his feelings clear on the snooker facilities in Saudi Arabia in comparison to some UK venues.

The seven-time world champion has never previously held back on his verdict of different venues, describing playing at London's Alexandra Palace as 'disgusting' back in January.

He appeared for a TV interview wearing a thick coat because of the cold temperatures, and said that the venue - which hosted the World Darts Championship weeks earlier - made him 'felt ill'.

In 2018, after winning a match at the K2 Leisure Centre in Crawley, O'Sullivan called it a 'hellhole' and said it 'smelt of urine' - although that wasn't a view shared by any other visitor that week, it appeared.

In comparison, O'Sullivan has taken a completely different view of the two events that have taken place in Saudi Arabia this year.

His path to the quarter-finals of the Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters was anything but straightforward, as he overcame a final frame decider to defeat China's Zhang Anda 6-5 on Wednesday evening.

O'Sullivan went 3-0 down, but capitalised on a missed red from his opponent to avoid going 4-0 down before the mid-session interval.

He then took the final two frames - including the final frame in one visit - to win his second match in Riyadh.

After the match, O'Sullivan spoke exclusively to SPORTbible and gave his unequivocal verdict on how the facilities in Saudi Arabia compare to some of the events held in the UK.

He explained: "The venue is unbelievable. The practice facilities are fantastic.

"At home, you'll be at the venue, and you'll literally just go there just to get your practice in and get out of there, because you don't even get a cup of tea there.

"Here, there's food all day long. There's nice sofa areas, there's changing rooms. You can have a shower. Everything's fantastic.

"There's plenty of practice rooms you can use, so you're not just sitting around all day, getting 20 minute knocks here and there. You can get a lot of good, good practice in.

"All the players are just spending most of their time at the venue - they're loving it here. It's how all the events should be."

There have been several criticisms raised about the tournament, including the Gulf nation's human rights record and the crowd numbers (O'Sullivan's match appeared to have a significantly better turnout than some others).

Fellow top stars have, though, echoed the views of 'The Rocket' about the standard of snooker facilities in the country and how they could be translated to some other world venues.

From a purely sporting perspective, there is an acceptance among some pundits that the financial value of the 10-year contract that World Snooker signed to play in Saudi Arabia is vital to snooker's immediate future.

Although he praised the facilities in Riyadh, though, O'Sullivan was less complementary about his own performance against Anda.

And he stated that even lifting the trophy on Sunday wouldn't leave him feeling confident about the state of his game at the present moment - regardless of how it may look to the outside world.

"I don't gain confidence in winning tournaments," he began. "Because if I would have done, I'd be probably the most confident man on the planet.

"Last year, I won five tournaments. I don't know how. But it didn't give me any confidence, because I actually wasn't playing with any confidence.

"I was playing just to compete, just to never give in. And that's tiring. It's a bit exhausting. It's not the way I want to play.

"I don't think I win here is going to cut it for me. It's more about, you know, the fluency, the composure, the cue action, the smoothness of getting through the ball, all those sorts of things are really more important to me than winning tournaments.

"Because if I get all the other stuff right, then eventually the tour wins will come. So that kind of just takes care of itself."