Runaway world number one Judd Trump to stay top of snooker rankings tree regardless of Jeddah result
Judd Trump is making his final preparations as he gets ready to defend his Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters title in Jeddah.
Trump won the inaugural edition of the Saudi Arabia Snooker Masters nearly 12 months ago when he dramatically ousted Mark Williams 10-9 on the very last black ball with a clutch counter clearance of 72.
Due to the huge prize money on offer at professional snooker’s ‘fourth major’, going into last year’s tournament, Trump’s world number one status was under threat, with several players in contention to replace him at the top of the rankings tree.
However, the status quo remained, and the Bristolian ended up significantly strengthening his world number one spot with the £500,000 he collected for winning the title.
A few months later, Trump denied Barry Hawkins 10-8 in an engrossing UK Championship final to scoop yet another of snooker’s biggest ranking event titles - and prize money pay outs. He pocketed £250,000 for his efforts in York, and further bolstered his position at the head of snooker’s world rankings.
Since then, Trump has not won a trophy on the World Snooker Tour - neither ranking, or invitational - but has amassed over £200,000 from runs at the World Grand Prix (semi-finalist), Players Championship (runner-up), World Championship (semi-finalist) in 2025, which has kept his cumulative rankings points tally ticking over.
Going into the second staging of the Saudi Arabia Masters, Trump is the sport’s runaway world number one.
Before a ball is struck by the top players at the Green Halls, Trump sits nearly £680,000 ahead of his nearest rankings challenger, world number two Kyren Wilson. Trump is over £1.1 million clear of third-placed Mark Williams.
This means that - unlike last year - Trump is guaranteed to leave Saudi Arabia Masters as the world number one, regardless of how he and his closest rivals get on.
With half-a-million pound once again given to the champion, ‘The Ace in the Pack’ cannot be mathematically overtaken.
But because of the huge top prize in Jeddah, Trump’s lead at the top can be severely slashed by Wilson, who is in contention later this season to usurp his most fiercest of career rivals.
Two seasons ago, Trump won five ranking events and collected a total of £550,000 from those tournaments alone. Due to the prize-money based two-year rolling ranking list system that the professional game uses, though, Trump will be defending that prize money in the coming months.
In comparison, before his triumph at the Crucible, Wilson had a relatively poor 2023/24 term - by his standards - reaching just one ranking event semi-final.
On the end-of-season provisional ranking list, Trump is top with Wilson second, but ‘The Warrior’ will feel he has a chance to achieve a career ambition by scaling the top of the rankings mountain at some point this season.