Mark Selby: I've been suffering for years and bottling it up but speaking out has helped depression battle
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Updated 01/03/2022 at 18:02 GMT
World No. 1 Mark Selby revealed earlier this year that he has been battling depression. The four-time world champion Selby has been doing online sessions with a doctor to try and help in his fight against the illness. Speaking to Eurosport at the Welsh Open he opened up about his struggles over the last few years.
Selby: I've been suffering for years with depression and bottling it up
Mark Selby has revealed that he has been “suffering for a few years” with depression and “bottling everything up” – but feels “half the battle is won” after speaking out.
He made the decision to speak out after consulting his wife Vicky about the best way to move forward.
“I feel as though I should have done it a long time ago,” Selby said in the Eurosport studio after beating Chen Zifan in the first round of the Welsh Open.
“I’ve been suffering for a few years and bottling everything up and not really saying anything. I’ve been on medication for probably four or five years now.
“Vicky kept saying to me, ‘I think you should probably say it’. But I’m not one to say it and just make it an excuse. There was never really a right time and I never felt it was the right time to say it.
“We were travelling home after the Masters, Vicky had gone into a service station to get a drink and I just sat there staring out the window and felt I couldn’t just carry on, keep bottling it up and trying to hide it all. Basically wearing a mask.
“Rather than say it in an interview, I thought if you do it on Twitter obviously there’s a lot of people on there, it’s probably the best way. And it felt the easier way for me, rather than verbally saying it in front of the camera."
Four-time world champion Selby has been doing online sessions with a doctor to try and help in his battle against depression.
He says he still has a “long way to go” and finds it toughest when his mind is given opportunity to wander.
“When I’m at the table and working out the breaks, you’re thinking of nothing else except the shots you are playing. The hardest part for me is when I’m sitting in my chair and trying not to think about too many things.
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“It’s not really snooker related, it’s just a lot of things off the table. 2016 I was in a bad place, even when I won the Worlds. If you look back when I’d won the final and picked the trophy up, Vicky said she came to the table with her and Sofia [their daughter] and I basically just looked through them as if they weren’t even there. She knew that I wasn’t really right then.
“Now I’ve mentioned it, I feel as though half the battle is won. But there’s still a long way to go.”
“I find it hard to talk about my games, I have snooker depression for two or three hours after my matches,” said O’Sullivan at the European Masters.
“Talking about it puts me in a bad place. I call it snooker depression because it is depression due to snooker. I don’t just wake up and say ‘I’m depressed’ - you aren’t when you are doing something you enjoy.
“You might afterwards, but you can get it doing this job if it bothers you and you are not enjoying it. And that happens to me, snooker plays on the mind. If you love your job, any job, then you won’t suffer with it – unless you are totally detached from your feelings. Let’s call it sports depression, across the board.”
O’Sullivan plays on Tuesday at the Welsh Open after reaching the final of the European Masters.
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