Could Luca Brecel lose professional World Snooker Tour card just over a year after Crucible crown?
Former world champion Luca Brecel will head for the Northern Ireland Open in Belfast later this month under increasing pressure to find some wins, with his place on the World Snooker Tour in doubt due to a poor run of form in ranking results since his totemic Crucible victory in Sheffield last year.
The Northern Ireland Open in Belfast is live on Eurosport and discovery+ from October 20-27.
Luca Brecel remains in danger of losing his professional tour card despite becoming Belgium’s first world champion at the Crucible last year.
The charismatic world No. 6 is ranked a lowly 60th in the end-of-season rankings, only four places above the top 64 cut-off mark, with his £500,000 winner’s cheque from the World Championship set to come off his points total before the end of the season.
Brecel is set to drop to 73,900 points on the tour’s money-based list with recent English Open semi-finalist Ishpreet Singh Chadha on 64,100 points in 64th spot and former Crucible semi-finalist Marco Fu on 64,000 in 65th place.
There remains enough time and events for Brecel to drag himself away from the danger zone, but he will require a marked upturn in form and fortunes to avoid the unthinkable scenario of dropping off the tour.
Finishing outside the safety net would see him forced to return to Q School at the end of the season with no guarantees about his future spot on the professional circuit next season.
It has been an astonishing descent from prominence since Brecel’s rampant form in claiming the world title in 2023 with an 18-15 win over four-time champion Mark Selby in Sheffield only 17 months ago.
Brecel faces talented Chinese potter He Guoqiang, who defeated Ronnie O’Sullivan in the last 64 of the English Open, in the first round of the Northern Ireland Open at the Waterfront Hall in Belfast, live on Eurosport and discovery+ between October 20-27.
Brecel, who turned professional in 2011, has won only four matches this season with his best finish seeing him lose 4-2 to Jak Jones in the British Open last 16 last month.
The four-time ranking event winner also failed to qualify for the Wuhan Open after losing 5-4 to Duane Jones in the first round in July and is already out of the International Championship next month after losing 6-3 to Jiang Jun in his opener qualifier.
He is 92nd on the one-year list which would see him miss the World Grand Prix (top 32), Players Championship (top 16) and Tour Championship (top 12) before the World Championship.
The 29-year-old lost to O’Sullivan in the finals of the non-ranking Shanghai Masters and Riyadh World Masters last season, but could not replicate that level of form in ranking events with a 5-3 loss to Martin O’Donnell in the Welsh Open quarter-finals his best display of the campaign.