SNOOKER: Hendry humbled by world No 73

MARCUS CAMPBELL admitted to being "dumbfounded" last night after inflicting the worst-ever defeat on the six-times world champion, Stephen Hendry.

Campbell completed a 9-0 whitewash of his fellow Scot to reach the last 32 of the pounds 460,000 Liverpool Victoria UK Championship in Bournemouth, then said: "It hasn't sunk in yet and it probably won't until I get home and tell my friends. But while I'm still on cloud nine there was no way I was going to lose this match."

The 26-year-old from Dumbarton had laid the foundations for a remarkable result on Wednesday night when he won all eight frames of the opening session. "Stephen just seems to be lacking in confidence," said the world No 73, who now meets Australia's Quinten Hann in the second round. "He was strolling round the table as though he had got a million problems on his mind."

Five-times UK champion Hendry, still one victory away from equalling Steve Davis' all-time best of six, did not did not make any excuses for his sorry display. "This result has been coming for probably 18 months to two years," the 29-year-old Scot said. "My confidence has been going down and down and at the end I couldn't wait to get out of there. I'm afraid it's back to the drawing board. I've got to go back to basics practically to how I played when I first began in the game. I was watching myself on television this afternoon against Steve Davis in the 1990 UK Championship and it looked as though there were two different players.

"My confidence has drained and drained and it didn't matter who I was playing here, I was always likely to lose 9-0. Marcus is a good player but he is not a tournament winner and I should never have lost by such a margin. But when you get down on a shot and you think: 'I'm not going to pot this ball', then it's not a good platform to win again."

Hendry's previous heaviest defeat came in 1987 when he lost 9-1 to Cliff Thorburn at the International Open in Stoke.

Two other former UK champions - Davis and John Parrott - had no such problems. Davis drubbed Devon left-hander Andy Hicks 9-2 to reach the last 16 while Parrott joined him with a 9-3 win over Steve James.