As Stephen Hendry returns to the green baize next season via an invitational card, I thought it’d be a good idea to look at one of his lesser talked about eras, and that’s his post-2000s career. While it significantly differed from his accolades of the previous decade, it’s still worth taking a look at some of the notables that occurred following his established period of dominance.
One of the first things to look at would be Hendry’s ranking title success following the turn of the decade. He reached twelve ranking finals from 2000, with his last venture to a final occurring in 2006. Of these twelve endeavours, Hendry managed to win four, taking his ranking tally from 32 to the acclaimed 36. This 33% success rate fell drastically from over 70% in the 1990s (32 wins from 45 finals), which highlights just how damaging Hendry was during this decade.
Another factor to consider, which branches off his ranking competition are his Triple Crown voyages. From 2000, Hendry reached two UK finals as well as a Masters and World Championship final. Most will remember his final frame deciding clash against Peter Ebdon in WSC 2002, which Hendry credits as his one of his most crushing defeats. However, Hendry would have another (and his last) Triple Crown contention against Ebdon in the 2006 final, where his opponent once again got the better of him.
Despite these efforts, it wouldn’t be fair to look at his finals alone. It would be more suitable to observe his Triple Crown consistency throughout the 2000s. If we look at his WSC journey post-2000, Hendry’s experience and competitiveness carried him through to numerous quarter-finals, including his year of retirement in 2012. This doesn’t include his two terrific semi-final efforts in 2004 and 2008. The same can be said about his UK and Masters attempts, although there was a failure to reach the latter stages of these events following the 2006/07 season.
One thing that never left Hendry was his ability to score and make century breaks. He was the leading century maker in the 1990s by a substantial margin (418 according to Cuetracker), and was still third on the list during the 2000s (257), only overtaken by O’Sullivan and Higgins. Considering how fewer frames Hendry played in the 2000s, the fact that he maintained a solid 7%+ frame per century rate (slightly improving his 1990s rate) just displays his scoring prowess.
Many have speculated and given their thoughts as to why Hendry didn’t accomplish as much as expected in the post-2000s. Those reasons mentioned aren’t the purpose for writing this, rather than to emphasise just how brilliant he was during the previous decade. So brilliant in fact, that anything less would seem like a failure in most people’s eyes.
O’Sullivan said following his sixth world title that he would perhaps rather have Hendry’s career in being able to dominate over a period. If you asked Hendry, he’d probably say the same. Whatever Hendry’s reasons are for returning to the circuit, he is welcomed by all as we hope to see some big breaks and clearances that make us feel thirty years younger. He only had a few days practice for the World Seniors due to lockdown and still made some significant breaks during the event.
Regardless, the King of the Crucible returns to the table once again. How do you think he will fare among the rest of the crowd?
Like this Short? Click here to read: Stephen Hendry's Five Ranking Titles 1990/91 - Throwback
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