Stephen Hendry has looked like a man on a mission so far in the tournament. For over a year, he has told anyone who will listen that he is hitting the balls well in practice and that his time is coming so far as putting it together in tournament play. There had been little evidence of that level of play being transferred to the match table until Hendry arrived at The Crucible a fortnight ago.

But since a battling opening round victory against the talented Mark Allen which saw Hendry rally from 6-3 behind against an opponent who had caused Hendry problems previously, the Scotsman has gained in strength in every round and produced his most fluent snooker for many years, reminiscent of the type of performance he produced in his days of dominance during the mid-1990s.

Hendry’s great match play experience proved too intimidating for Ding Junhui in round two and he dictated the match against Ryan Day right from the start in his quarter-final, no mean feat against a player who had fought back so well against defending champion and ever the street fighter, John Higgins in the previous round.

Where Day and Ding fell down against Hendry was that neither player was able to regularly capitalise on the occasions when they got amongst the balls. Day made several breaks of 30 or 40 but did not win enough frames in one visit, something that Hendry has managed to do with ominous regularity during the tournament to date. He certainly should not expect this to be a failing of his semi final opponent.

It is a strange thing to say given that he has recorded a 147 already in the tournament, but Ronnie O’ Sullivan has got to the semi finals despite having only shown flashes of his best snooker. Evidently one of those flashes occurred in the final frame of his second round victory over Mark Williams.

The maximum he scored to seal the match if not the keys to a new Bentley has been touted by many observers as the greatest of all time. In terms of the quality of shots it certainly ranks very high, although I personally would nominate one of O’ Sullivan’s other eight maximums in tournament play as the finest ever. Not his 5 minutes and 20 seconds effort against Mick Price here in 1997, but his match clinching effort against Mark Selby at the UK Championship earlier this season. As with the Williams match, this break came in the final frame of the match. Unlike the Williams match, it came in the deciding frame of a match O’ Sullivan had trailed 8-5 in and had a place in the final riding on the outcome of the frame.

O’ Sullivan’s play over the season has, by the admission of the man himself, been more solid and consistent and sometimes he has sacrificed playing all out attack in order to get through matches when not at his best. That approach has been evident during the tournament and O’ Sullivan has struggled through some sessions in reaching this stage.

It is worth noting, however, that O’ Sullivan has not lost a single session of snooker so far in the tournament and so working harder to win the scrappy frames has worked in his favour. Certainly, the outcome of his matches against Williams and against the talented rookie Liang Wenbo could have been much different had O’ Sullivan trailed to them after the first session.

These two giants of the green baize have had many jousts over the years and have attracted their fair share of controversy and drama. O’ Sullivan infamously walked out and conceded the match against Hendry in the UK Championship in 2006, but the last time the pair met at The Crucible it was Hendry who practically submitted, when O’ Sullivan defeated him 17-4 at this stage of the competition four years ago before defeating Hendry’s compatriot Graeme Dott in the final.

As in 2004, the perceived logic is that whoever wins this match will win the tournament given that the other semi-final is being contested by two players who have not previously won a ranking tournament. That may well prove to be true, but it is worth remembering that Allister Carter destroyed Stephen Hendry in round two here a year ago.

This reminds me in some ways of a boxing match. In the red corner you have a boxer with plenty of power punching who will pepper his opponent with shots early in the fight, but who becomes more vulnerable if the fight goes the distance as he is short of stamina. In the blue corner you have a boxer who can take a barrage of punches and has a chin constructed of granite and if he gets taken the distance, he will prosper in the latter rounds when his punches connect as his opponent tires.

In this match, O’ Sullivan is the man in the red corner and Hendry finds himself in the blue corner. If O’ Sullivan is to win the match, I feel he has to pull away in either the second or third session because I feel he could be there for the taking if the match goes the full distance. Hendry, even at the age of 39, still has first class powers of concentration and an unshakeable temperament. O’ Sullivan needs to keep focused throughout if he is to come out on top and history tends to show that if he is taken all the way in long matches, he can be beaten.

This is a tough match to call because Hendry has been a revelation this tournament. Very few people could have envisaged the level of play he would produce to carry him to this stage of the tournament. Now he has got this far and got to the one table situation, he will feel as though he is playing in his living room and he will be able to smell the scent of success again.

While Hendry’s competitive edge is not in doubt, I have felt from the start of the tournament that Ronnie O’ Sullivan will be acutely aware of the great opportunity he has to win this tournament for a third time. He has paced himself well in progressing to the last four, largely having played in second gear but making big breaks when required.

I expect O’ Sullivan to be motivated by the occasion and his opponent and although the match might not quite live up to expectations, I believe O’ Sullivan will have just about enough firepower and resolve to prevent his old adversary from continuing his bid for an eighth world title. Prediction: Hendry 13-17 O’ Sullivan