Potting marathon at the Crucible Theatre

April is an intriguing month in England for sporting events with the football season coming to an end and the cricket season starting - although why the latter begins so early is beyond my understanding.

Surrounding these mainstream competitions are four events that typify the diversity of the sports calendar. First there is the Boat Race, followed quickly by the Grand National, the London Marathon and the Masters Golf tournament before culminating in the World Snooker Championships, which is probably the most engaging of them all.

Last Saturday saw the beginning of the World Snooker Championships at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield. This is the highpoint of the snooker year and players who win it are generally perceived by their peers to be the best in the world.

The reason for its status lies behind the length of each match. Rather than the shortened version players are used to on the circuit of the best of nine frames, this begins in round one with the best of 19. This format usually means the chances of a shock are greatly reduced as it is difficult for a player of lesser ability to sustain great form over this period of play.

This extended format is also why it has proved so successful on television, which the BBC has covered for as long as I can remember. Rather than entertainment being thrust into the viewer's living room with overexcited commentators and a myriad of camera angles, this spectacle just washes over you.

One main view of the table, close ups of individual shots and most importantly of all the intrusive zoom in on the players faces are the only viewing lens' available. This last angle is the most important as it allows us to see the anguish a player is going through as the mental battle unfolds with his opponent. It is often a bigger clue to picking the winner of a match than anything that happens on the table.

Snooker itself is going through a transition period at present mainly due to the loss of the tobacco industries sponsorship. This has been replaced for the World Championships by 888.COM but elsewhere at less prestigious events the story is not so promising.

Only six tournaments make up the ranking season due to the lack of sponsors which in some eyes, particularly reigning champion John Higgins who is going into promoting tournaments himself, makes the system of determining the top 16 a bit of a lottery.

This makes the World Championships even more important to the sport as it is the showpiece event given hours of coverage on a major channel attracting millions of daily viewers. If this does not have the desired impact then some serious thinking needs to be done at snooker's governing body headquarters in Bristol.

Predicting the winner of such an event is always tricky especially given the rising standard and the strength in depth of the current crop of players. Higgins played well to beat Matthew Stevens in the first round and this longer format will suit him as it always does and it will need a good performance from someone to relieve him of his crown.

That someone might well be crowd favourite Ronnie O'Sullivan, surely the most talented player to ever pick up a cue. The fact that he can play equally well with both hands is a testament to his genius. If he is mentally right then he will probably win and it will be an exciting tournament if he stays involved right to the final.

Of the others, the challenge could come from Stephen Maguire and Mark Selby who have found their form at the right time with Chinese wonder kid Ding Junhui always a threat should he produce his best form. Most pundits expect Junhui to win the World Championships one day but whether it will be this year is another thing and he has shown in the past he struggles on occasions to keep his emotions intact and his game has suffered accordingly.

It is 15 days of constant matches and some will undoubtedly end off finishing late into the night, a Crucible speciality, but one man will come through this indoor marathon and he will deserve his victory. The player playing the best snooker always wins this event and that is always a good characteristic for an event to be labelled a world championship.

Whether it will end with a match such as the famous Taylor and Davis clash is another thing but the viewer who sits through the whole tournament will be rewarded considerably if Monday night approaches and there is only a White and Black left on the table and the match depends on it.