It was the closest thing to blurry speed that the Crucible will ever see. Down 10-12, Ronnie O'Sullivan stepped urgently around the table in pursuit of a maximum 147, stroking shots with his brand of insouciant impatience patented by Alex Higgins and O'Sullivan's own hero, Jimmy White.

When he rolled the ball up for the last red, the Crucible actually rocked, its patrons briefly aroused from the state of hypnotic hush and muted applause which generally dominates. O'Sullivan seemed to initiate his striking action before he'd even crouched into position, while he appeared to be gunslinging with such nonchalance as to defy the balls not to drop. Eventually, of course, one didn't. Having coasted through a minefield of reds, O'Sullivan whipped through a relatively straightforward set of colours but overplayed on the blue, leaving a slightly awkward cut to the centre on the pink.

Despite decent club players in Ireland having made tougher angles, there was an inevitability to O'Sullivan's miss. He paused for the first time. Meantime, Stephen Hendry, his opponent, looked on with that expression of glum indifference he favours whenever he is forced to the chair, but he did allow himself a hint of a smile as his opponent began to dismantle the table with a touch of popstar flash, chasing away that horribly cobwebbish feel to the Crucible. By missing the pink, O'Sullivan cost himself £147,000 but shrugged it off with a brief grimace and returned to the table with the next break to fire home another century.

Both men - who seem no different than the quirky teenagers who made such a revolutionary impact on the game - left the arena laughing and sideswiping, even as Clive Everton described their dual as "snooker for the gods".

In studio, a wide-eyed Willie Thorne was no less emphatic, declaring that we had just witnessed the "best session of snooker ever played anywhere in the world".

(A dubious claim: this column once witnessed two friends battle through an all day session which finished at 33 frames to 32, defined by dizzying breaks of 17, 12 and nine. The `classic' match was ended when the proprietor witnessed his baize ripped by the leader who, drained with tension, completely missed the cue ball.)

O'Sullivan is often described by pundits as the best player never to have reached a world final - perhaps he is mimicking White's flawed pedigree to a particularly extreme degree - and in the evening time, it was easy to see why. Gone was the flicker of mirth which had warmed Hendry's eyes in the early session, instead he had reverted to that icy trance and if not playing perfect snooker, he made precious few mistakes. O'Sullivan, though, still played on his emotions and was now cagey and rash, missing crucial pots and displaying a callow temperament. In the penultimate frame, he plumped for a wild shot to nothing out of sheer frustration, while Hendry emotionlessly rolled a double into the centre pocket and went on to sweep the table.

Days earlier, Hendry had announced himself "the worst doubles player in the world". It's just that he doesn't miss them. And afterwards, O'Sullivan spoke about not having put Hendry under enough consistent pressure, although admitted that he enjoyed the adrenalin rush of the earlier sessions, the spirit of it. It is difficult to imagine Hendry being so magnanimous had the situation been reversed. He would have been hurting too much. O'Sullivan is driven more by a quest for perfection than a need for official titles.

It may be a while yet before O'Sullivan plays in the final match at the Crucible. Snooker, like most other professional sports nowadays, floats on a stream of silly money. It was slightly disconcerting to see O'Sullivan dismiss the loss of a sum which would gain you a good inch of property in this city.

This attitude was a world away from that of Alf Ramsey's, the manager of England's World Cup winning side in 1966, who died earlier this week at the age of 79. Although the tributes inevitably featured nostalgic footage of the summer now at the apex of the English sporting consciousness, there was a vacuum about the man himself.

Ramsey cut an austere, more or less unreadable figure, a seemingly cold man who spoke in that clipped tone which belongs to the world of Graham Green.

Only once did he abandon his stiff reserve, likening the Argentinian team to animals after the infamous world cup quarter-final. Although he commanded utter loyalty from his players - Alan Ball said that the manager had been one of the greatest influences on his life - his place in the public's heart was less certain.

"Did the public ever really love him?", wondered Gerald Sindstat of Ball, who suggested that such manifest affection was alien to the English psyche. As with Bobby Moore, he said, Ramsey's inestimable contribution to the game was only really recognised after his passing and he expressed hope that the FA would seek to underline his stature posthumously even as they revamp Wembley stadium.

Ramsey was unceremoniously removed from the his £7,000 per annum post after a dismal 1974 World Cup qualifying campaign and he retreated with typical finality from public life, appearing only for infrequent reunions with the boys of 1966.

His understanding of sport probably couldn't encompass the bewilderingly colourful and hyped occasions which fill our screens every weekend now, from the Premiership to the Formula 1 in San Marino.