1989 UK Championship: Stephen Hendry

The evening of Sunday December 3, 1989 seemed significant in the world of snooker. As a 20-year-old Stephen Hendry won the UK Championship at Preston there was an overwhelming sense that the baton of power was being passed from one great champion to the next. The end of the decade painted a worrying picture for the dominant figure of the sport in the 1980s.

Steve Davis had lost finals before. Yet this felt different. Since turning professional in 1985 Hendry had been seen as the future of snooker, the boy who could knock Davis off his perch. Winning the 1987 Grand Prix and 1989 Masters, Hendry was flying up the world rankings and justifying the hype surrounding him.

1988/89: Doug Mountjoy and his Indian Summer

How a former fishmonger rejuvenated the career of 46-year-old Doug Mountjoy at the start of the 1988/89 snooker season.

April 1988: As Doug Mountjoy shook hands with Neal Foulds at the Crucible, reality struck. The 13-1 defeat in the second round of the World Championship in Sheffield was bad enough, yet it was an appropriate end to a disastrous season that would see the Welshman slip outside of the top 16 for the first time in 11 years.

"I didn't have a game," Mountjoy revealed after the 1988 UK Championship. "It's difficult to find out what you're doing wrong." For a man about to turn 46, it appeared that he was past the point of no return. "I understood there was nowhere else to go unless it was surviving down the bottom end of the ladder."

1983 UK Championship: Alex Higgins

Turbulent could be one way to describe the start of Alex Higgins’ 1983/84 snooker season. First round defeats in both the International Open and Professional Players Championship illustrated his struggles on the green baize, with the situation in his domestic life hardly helping matters.

1985 UK Championship: Willie Thorne

The calendar year of 1985 was going so well for Willie Thorne. A breakthrough win at the Mercantile Credit Classic in January provided the perfect start, and although Thorne's performances towards the end of the 84/85 season and the beginning of 85/86 were not particularly encouraging, it looked as if the December would see the twelve months bookended with another ranking tournament win.