Ronnie O'Sullivan will face Jackson Page at the World Snooker Championship as he looks to win the prestigious competition once again.
The Rocket has previously secured the prize in 2001, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2013, 2020 and 2022 - with only John Pulman, Fred Davis and Joe Davis winning it more.
O'Sullivan will enter this year's World Snooker Championship hoping to win all three triple crown events.
He has already bagged the Masters, having beaten Ali Carter during a dramatic final back in January.
Ronnie O'Sullivan will be hoping to win the World Snooker Championship for the eighth time in his career
GETTY
The draw for the World Snooker Championship was made on Thursday morning, with O'Sullivan among the 16 seeded players.
And the Rocket will pit his wits against Page in the first round.
While the 22-year-old is relatively new to the snooker scene, his match with O'Sullivan will be intriguing given his recent victory over John Higgins.
Page also Mark Selby at the recent World Open, too.
And those performances suggest O'Sullivan will need to be at his best to ensure he wins the competition and boosts his chances of winning all three triple crown events in the same calendar year.
O'Sullivan hasn't always had things his way, however.
And the Rocket, speaking prior to the tournament, has admitted he's still hurt by defeats to Barry Hawkins and Ding Junhui in 2016 and 2017 respectively.
Discussing his defeat to Ding, he said: “He got a good lead, I shouldn’t have let him get that lead as I had chances, but there was someone in the crowd that I didn’t want there and it played on my mind a bit and I thought get him out, once he was out I was fine.
“I came back at him but every time I was two or three frames behind.
"I thought I was playing well and I’m going to get level and just try to get ahead, but he kept pulling away.
"I was a bit shocked. I thought I haven’t broke him yet, I kept coming at him, I was striking the ball really well and I came out thinking I don’t know really how I’ve lost that other than he just had a lead and played really well and performed really well that day.
"I came away thinking I could have won that tournament.”
Discussing his defeat to Hawkins in 2016, he added: “I had been playing loads of exhibitions so I had no safety game really, I couldn’t win a close game.
“I must have had 13 or 12 breaks over 70, but I just couldn’t win the close ones.
"But towards 9-9 I think there was a point where I found my safety shots and I thought if I win this I could win the tournament. My game was coming good at the right time but he won the last frame and I was gutted.
LATEST SPORTS NEWS:
Ronnie O'Sullivan has won the World Snooker Championship seven times
GETTY
“Those were probably the two matches when I have been most gutted because I thought if I got through them I fancied it. When you start to fancy it that’s when it gets exciting.”
FULL WORLD SNOOKER CHAMPIONSHIP DRAW:
Zhang Anda vs Jak Jones
Luca Brecel vs David Gilbert
Tom Ford vs Ricky Walden
Ding Junhui vs Jack Lisowski
Ali Carter vs Stephen Maguire
Shaun Murphy vs Lyu Haotian
Mark Allen vs Robbie Williams
Ronnie O'Sullivan has opened up on his World Snooker Championship regrets ahead of the competition this year
GETTY
Mark Selby vs Joe O'Connor
Kyren Wilson vs Dominic Dale
Gary Wilson vs Stuart Bingham
Bary Hawkins vs Ryan Day
Robert Milkins vs Pang Junxu
Judd Trump vs Hossein Vafaei
John Higgins vs Jamie Jones
Mark Williams vs Si Jiahui
Ronnie O'Sullivan vs Jackson Page
