{"id":483,"date":"2022-03-23T10:43:00","date_gmt":"2022-03-23T10:43:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.derniercriweb.solutions\/snooker\/legend\/cliff-thorburn\/"},"modified":"2026-05-19T15:05:30","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T14:05:30","slug":"cliff-thorburn","status":"publish","type":"legend","link":"https:\/\/www.derniercriweb.co.uk\/snooker\/legend\/cliff-thorburn\/","title":{"rendered":"Cliff Thorburn"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Clifford Charles Devlin<\/strong>&nbsp;<strong>Thorburn<\/strong>&nbsp;is a Canadian retired professional&nbsp;snooker&nbsp;player. Nicknamed &#8220;The Grinder&#8221; because of his slow, determined style of play, he won the&nbsp;World Snooker Championship&nbsp;in&nbsp;1980, defeating&nbsp;Alex Higgins&nbsp;18\u201316 in the final to become the first world champion in the sport&#8217;s modern era from outside the United Kingdom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Thorburn was runner-up in two other World Championships, losing 21\u201325 to&nbsp;John Spencer&nbsp;in the&nbsp;1977&nbsp;final and 6\u201318 to&nbsp;Steve Davis&nbsp;in the&nbsp;1983&nbsp;final. One of his most celebrated moments came during his second-round encounter with&nbsp;Terry Griffiths&nbsp;in 1983, when he became the first player to compile a&nbsp;maximum break&nbsp;in a World Championship match. He was the second player, after Davis, to make a televised 147 break in professional competition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">His other notable achievements include holding the&nbsp;number one ranking&nbsp;during the&nbsp;1981\u201382 season&nbsp;and winning the invitational&nbsp;Masters&nbsp;three times, in&nbsp;1983,&nbsp;1985, and&nbsp;1986. This made him the first player to win the Masters three times and the first to retain the title. He retired from the main professional tour in 1996 and was inducted into&nbsp;Canada&#8217;s Sports Hall of Fame&nbsp;in 2001.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Thorburn subsequently competed in&nbsp;Snooker Legends&nbsp;events and on the&nbsp;World Seniors Tour, winning the&nbsp;2018 Seniors Masters&nbsp;at the Crucible Theatre at age 70. On 5 January 2022, shortly before turning 74, he played his last competitive match at the&nbsp;2022 UK Seniors Championship.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":498,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":true},"categories":[],"class_list":["post-483","legend","type-legend","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.derniercriweb.co.uk\/snooker\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/legend\/483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.derniercriweb.co.uk\/snooker\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/legend"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.derniercriweb.co.uk\/snooker\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/legend"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.derniercriweb.co.uk\/snooker\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.derniercriweb.co.uk\/snooker\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.derniercriweb.co.uk\/snooker\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}