And O'Sullivan admitted that he had not expected it would take him so long to rise to these heights - he has been professional for nine years.

"I am surprised it took me so long to reach my first world final," he said. "I thought that I would have won it once or twice by now.

"I know how good I was and if I had kept my form up of 15-16 I believe I could have won it.

"I'm not being big-headed when I say that and a lot of good players have won the world title.

"But that's history now and I've just got to move on and get on with the task of trying to win the final.

"There are a lot of things I would have liked to have changed and for things to be different - but they aren't and I've just got to accept that and get on with things.

Scintillating

"Second place is no consolation. It has got to be the worst thing in the world, whatever the sport, watching someone else picking up a trophy.

"Hopefully that will be enough to spur me on and that I will be good enough over the next couple of days.

"It doesn't matter who I play. Whoever it is, then so be it. I am just looking forward to a good match over the weekend."

Swail opened the first frame of the last session with a scintillating break of 114 - breaking down on the yellow when it seemed that he would beat his own 140 highest break of the tournament.