Ronnie O’Sullivan overcomes illness to grind past Barry Hawkins at Masters

An apparently under-the-weather O’Sullivan was keen for a curry after fighting his way into the last four

Ronnie O’Sullivan beat Barry Hawkins at Ally Pally (PA Wire)

Ronnie O’Sullivan relished the prospect of a “massive, dirty curry” after grinding out a 6-3 win over Barry Hawkins in a Masters quarter-final that lacked spice.

The seven-time Masters winner looked under the weather as he wore a thick coat for his post-match TV interview, muttering: “I fancy a curry – a massive, dirty curry. There’s nothing I don’t like.”

In a match awash with errors from both players, O’Sullivan kicked off with a break of 88 but had to wait until the penultimate frame to post his next half-century, a 60 to move one frame from victory.

Despite riding his luck early on, Hawkins will seldom have a better chance of improving his dismal record against O’Sullivan, having lost 17 of their previous 20 clashes, including a 10-1 thrashing in the 2016 Masters final.

Hawkins, an impressive winner over Neil Robertson in the last 16, could have been 4-0 down at the interval but instead went in all-square after being handed a series of uncharacteristic chances by the world number one.

A missed pink in the second allowed Hawkins to level, and Hawkins was not punished for a rash, missed yellow in the fourth as he somehow made it 2-2 at the interval.

A missed blue, among a number of others, from O’Sullivan gave Hawkins the chance to nudge ahead for the first time at 3-2, but Hawkins failed to take a series of opportunities to establish a two-frame lead.

Hawkins struggled to capitalise on O’Sullivan’s errors (Getty Images)

A horrendous miscue from O’Sullivan, in which he missed the pink completely, was greeted with a sigh of exasperation but Hawkins missed the same ball at a stretch with the spider to let the favourite back in.

Worse was to follow from both players with O’Sullivan emerging on top after a catalogue of errors in frame seven, before wrapping things up to book a last-four clash with either Shaun Murphy or Jack Lisowski.

O’Sullivan said he had been “lucky to get through” to what will be his 15th appearance in the semi-finals of the Masters.

“I felt bad for Barry, I just dragged him down to my level. It’s a funny old game,” O’Sullivan told BBC Sport. “I didn’t feel any pressure at all to be honest, maybe that’s why I played like I did. I think you need that pressure sometimes to get you motivated.

“That’s the most awful standard of snooker. I just said to Barry at the end: ‘Sorry mate.’ I’ve just got this ability with certain players where if I play bad, then they play even worse.

“Some of the other guys will punish me, but I’ve just had it all through my life. Like everybody else in this country I’ve had a cold for about four weeks now. Lost my hearing as well when I was in China, I’ve not been too well, but I think everybody has been like that.”