A Hurricane-less year
On 24th of July 2010 the people's champion, Alex Higgins was stepping into eternity. It was a sad day for snooker, as well as for the fans of snooker. I remember seeing the news on Twitter and not believing that it could be true. You know as well as I do, that some people have the cruel heart to make sinister jokes over things like this, but unfortunately this was no joke ... The Hurricane left us to play snooker in Heaven with the likes of Paul Hunter or Joe Davis.
As a person, he was known to be quite difficult and hard to work with, a troubled soul, but as a player no one could ever underestimate his achievements and the way he changed snooker. With his fast and furious way of potting the balls, with his beautiful madness, with that passion that could be easily seen in every match he played, with his boldness and the way he was resisting to wear the bow-tie - these are a few of the things that made Alex so special and so loveable for many of the snooker fans.
When Higgins was at the table the balls were at his disposal. They were just too hypnotised by the way he was potting them, to resist him. The audience was mesmerized as he was clearing the table and won his matches. It was some kind of dependency between Alex and the public: he needed the people to feel alive and the people needed him to feel they were still alive.
The joyful screams from when he was doing one of his amazing spins, or hitting a century break, or just pot a ball that seemed impossible to pot, tell the story better than words.
It's been a Hurricane-less year and many more will come, but I don't think that such a lively and dynamic person as Alex was would have liked us to be sad on this day. He gave his heart and soul to snooker, to make people go mad with excitement when he was potting the balls and that's the way he would have liked to be remembered. At least, that's what I think and how I want to remember him - as a champion, a winner, a survivor.
Below, you can find some videos that I selected from YouTube.
The two-time world champion loved snooker more than life. I remember him saying "snooker's like a drug". What a beautiful way to get high, don’t you think? :-)
Oh, and of you feel like dropping a tear or two, just do it ... I confess I've done it.
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