Dennis Taylor just after winning the 1985 championship

The 1985 World Snooker Championship final is often cited as the most exciting game of snooker ever seen. It was played on 24-29 April 1985 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield in the United Kingdom between Northern Irishman Dennis Taylor, appearing in his second final and Steve Davis, the then defending World Champion. Dennis_Taylor_0001 This work is copyrighted. ... Dennis_Taylor_0001 This work is copyrighted. ... Snooker table For the dog-agility Snooker class, see dog agility. ... The Crucible Theatre, located in the city centre of Sheffield, England is known for being a producing theatre, meaning shows are designed and rehearsed in-house. ... For other uses, see Sheffield (disambiguation). ... Dennis Taylor (recte Denis) (born January 19, 1949) is a retired Irish snooker player. ... Steve Davis OBE (born August 22, 1957) is an English professional snooker player who lives in Brentwood, Essex with his wife and two sons. ... The World Snooker Championship, currently held at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, is the climax of snookers annual calendar and the most important snooker event of the year in terms of prestige, prize money and world ranking points. ...

The event was in the eighth year of the BBC's coverage of the event, and snooker was reaching the zenith of its popularity. The climax of the final was watched by 18.5 million people, which was a record for BBC2, the channel showing the event, a record post-midnight audience for any channel in Britain and, at the time, the record audience for any sporting event in the country. The total match time of 14 hours 50 minutes was the longest ever recorded for a 35 frame match. The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is the largest publicly-funded radio and television broadcasting corporation of the United Kingdom (see British television). ... BBC Two (or BBC2 as it was formerly styled) was the second UK television station to be aired by the BBC. History The channel was scheduled to begin at 7:20pm on April 20, 1964 and show an evening of light entertainment, starting with the comedy show The Alberts and...

The early frames

Davis, who had been ranked the world number one for four years, and would remain in that position for another four, was strong favourite going into the event. He whitewashed Taylor in the first session, and after the first frame of the second was leading 8 frames to 0. However a superb fightback punctuated with fine breaks from Taylor saw him close the gap to only 7-9 at the end of the first day. Going into the final session, he had levelled the match at 11-11. The final instalment, a marathon five-hour effort, saw Davis lead 17-15 in the first to 18 frames final. Taylor clawed his way back to level at 17-17.

The black ball finish

The final frame, a very tense and nervous affair, lasted 68 minutes - three times as long as a typical frame between professional players, and was second-longest frame in ranking event history.

At 44-62 down, Taylor stayed alive by potting an incredible brown, followed by a tricky blue and pink, meaning that, for the first time, the title would be decided on the very last ball, the black. Each player had two goes on the black before Taylor was left with a reasonable middle-distance pot to the green pocket. However, he snatched at the shot a little and missed the pot, leaving (as he thought, in his disappointment) Davis a moderately easy cut into the top pocket from close enough range. Incredibly, Davis overcut the black (into a blind pocket, admittedly) and left Taylor with a fairly straightforward half-ball black into the same pocket from mid distance. This time the popular Irishman, almost stretching a fraction to avoid having to use the rest, made no mistake and snooker's greatest ever comeback was complete. This epic match was over at 12.26 a.m on a Monday morning.

In contrast to an ashen-faced Davis, Taylor's unrestrained joy - foot-stamping, finger-wagging and holding his cue aloft whilst hundreds of camera flashes popped around him - has become part of snooker lore. The celebrations back home in Ireland were scarcely less restrained.

No final since has matched the drama of that particular evening. Polls indicate that the final frame remains one of British sport's golden moments.

References and further resources

• Another perspective on the match from BBC News