After being the youngest champion of the historic tournament, Ronnie O’Sullivan overcame Ali Carter in a closely contested final at Alexandra Palace on Sunday to earn a record-tying eighth Masters title.

For the first time since 2017, Ronnie O’Sullivan wins the Masters at Alexandra Palace after overturning a 3-6 lead against Ali Carter. O’Sullivan puts himself up for a first-ever attempt at a perfect sweep of this season’s Triple Crown events at the World Championship in April.

The ‘Rocket’ fell behind Carter 3-6 after the opening set of the decisive evening session, but he raised his game in the crucial moments, winning seven of the last eight frames to win 10-7 and capture the Paul Hunter Trophy for the first time since 2017.

O’Sullivan, 48, is now the youngest and oldest winner of the Masters competition, having won it for the eighth time in December at the UK Championship.

29 years have passed since his first victory in 1995, when he was just 19 years old.

To be completely honest, I have no idea how I won this tournament,” O’Sullivan admitted to the BBC.
“I just delved deeply. I attempted to play a little more freely, but tonight I just tried to keep Ali honest, knowing that if he wanted to win, he would have to remove me from the game.

“I just wanted to see if he had it at the end.”

Notably, O’Sullivan’s triumph also marks his first-ever victories in the season’s first two Triple Crown tournaments; the World Championship will be decided on April 20.

The only three people to win all three Triple Crown events in a single campaign are Steve Davis (1987–88), Stephen Hendry (1994–95, 1995–96), and Mark Williams (2002–03).

O’Sullivan, who has been tied with Hendry for seven global titles since 2022, has another opportunity to break the current record of eight crowns.

The 44-year-old Carter’s long losing streak against his countryman O’Sullivan was maintained as a result of the Sunday night comeback.

Before Sunday’s main event, the Englishman had already suffered two losses in World Championship finals (in 2008 and 2012) and had only defeated the seven-time winner once in 19 confrontations.

Carter broke O’Sullivan’s previous record of nine hundreds in the Masters competition by recording three century breaks in the final, including an outstanding 127 in the one frame he did win in the evening session.

However, Carter’s search for his first victory in a Triple Crown event will probably not be eased by that remarkable achievement for some time to come—four years after he similarly gave up a mid-match lead in the final versus Stuart Bingham at Allly Pally.