Neil Robertson (born 11 February 1982) is an Australian professional snooker player who is a former world champion and former world number one. The only Australian to have won a ranking event, he is also the only player from outside the United Kingdom to have completed snooker's Triple Crown, having won the World Championship in 2010, the Masters in 2012 and 2022, and the UK Championship in 2013, 2015 and 2020. He has claimed a career total of 23 ranking titles, having won at least one professional tournament every year since 2006. A prolific break-builder, Robertson has compiled more than 850 century breaks in professional competition, including five maximum breaks. He is the fourth player in professional snooker history to reach the 800-century mark, after Ronnie O'Sullivan, John Higgins and Judd Trump. In the 2013–14 season, he became the first player to make 100 centuries in a single season, finishing with a record 103 centuries. Life and career Early career Robertson began his snooker career aged 14, when he became the youngest player to make a century break in an Australian ranking event. He began his professional career in the 1998/1999 season. At the age of 17, he reached the third qualifying round of the 1999 World Championship. In July 2003, he won the World Under-21 Snooker Championship in New Zealand. This earned him a vital wildcard spot on the subsequent WPBSA Main Tour. In December, he won the qualifying tournament for a wildcard place at the 2004 Masters, where he was subsequently defeated 2–6 by Jimmy White in the first round. Robertson lost his first quarter-final match to White too, at the 2004 European Open, by the scoreline of 3–5 this time. In the 2004–05 season, he moved up to the top 32 in the rankings, reaching the final stages of six of the eight tournaments, despite having to play at least two qualifying matches for each one. In two cases he got as far as the quarter-finals: at the 2005 Welsh Open, where he whitewashed Robert Milkins 5–0 in the first round, then went on to beat both Jimmy White and John Higgins 5–4, before suffering a 5–4 loss himself by the tournament's eventual winner, Ronnie O'Sullivan, after leveling the match from 4–1 behind; and at the 2005 Malta Cup, in which he defeated Mark Williams 5–1, then Jimmy White again by 5–2, but failed to achieve the