Mark "The Jester from Leicester" Selby

Selby showed potential as a teenager, but did not consistently shine until his twenties. He reached his first ranking final aged 19, the Regal Scottish in 2003, where he finished runner-up to David Gray, losing 9-7 in the final. Before that, he had also already reached the semi-finals of the 2002 China Open, despite leaving his hotel room at 2 a.m. instead of 2 p.m. for one match due to jetlag. His best tournament break is 141, which he produced in the 2008 Masters.

In the 2007 World Championships, he beat Stephen Lee 10-7 in the first round, having won 8 successive frames from being 5-0 behind[3]. Selby then defeated former World Champion Peter Ebdon 13-8, with five centuries (including three-in-a-row) to reach the quarter-finals. In the quarter-final, he beat Allister Carter 13-12, from 11-8 up and 11-12 down, in a match that lasted well over nine hours. He went on to reach the final by beating Shaun Murphy 17-16 from 14-16 down, in another deciding frame which he won thanks to a 64 break. Against Higgins in the final, Selby trailed 4-12 after the Sunday sessions, but won all six frames played in the third session on Monday afternoon before the players ran out of time due to the length of the frames. Thus he entered the final session only 10-12 down and closed to within one frame at 13-14, but eventually succumbed 13-18.