Ronnie O'Sullivan comes clean on 'worst thing i've ever done' and blames former ally

blamed his former coach for instigating a change to his game that the Rocket described as the "worst thing I've ever done in ." The seven-time world champion of their quarter-final, but maintains that he is struggling to find his best form.

O'Sullivan took over three months off from snooker before returning at the . He snapped his cue in January and has been finding his feet once again, brushing and Pang Junxu aside en route to the final eight.

During a press conference following victory over Pang, O'Sullivan opened up on a mystery coach that he believes did serious harm to the 49-year-old's career. He had previously told the that he was "messed up" by a coach and is trying not to "unravel" while at the baize.

Adding more details later, O'Sullivan explained: "I'm not going to say who it is, I don't think it's fair to say who that is. But it's probably the worst decision I've ever made in my snooker career, in hindsight.

"I did it because I wanted to improve, you always want to improve, but if I could turn the clock back I would. Worst thing I've ever done in snooker and I've done some bad things in snooker before."

When asked to pinpoint the exact moment he realised the big change to his game turned out to be negative, O'Sullivan replied: "I think when beat me here [at the 2023 ], when Luca beat me I really realised then.

"I thought 'wow' but I thought I could play my way out of it, but for two years I haven't. When I won this in 2020 I wasn't great but I was playing alright in spells, so thought: 'OK that's cool.' Then since Luca gave me a good hiding here it's just been awful really."

O'Sullivan led Brecel 10-6 in that quarter-final, but lost seven frames in a row to the eventual tournament winner.

He has arrived at the Crucible two years later without a coach and has not been receiving any technical help from professionals, instead psychologist Steve Peters is by his side.

O'Sullivan had been working with coach Lee Walker in the months before his absence from snooker, but they ended their partnership before travelling to Sheffield.

"I know what I need to correct," he told . "There will be no more coaches onboard, it will be just me and Steve Peters, trying to help me be a bit more instinctive and just try and find my own way of playing."