RONNIE O'Sullivan makes his first appearance in this season's Travis Perkins UK Championship today in York and does not plan to hang around.

O'Sullivan is one of snooker's 'Fab Four' whose second-round games have been held back so they can be shown at the start of BBC TV's coverage of the £615,000 event.

The 'Rocket' meets Lancashire hot potter Ian McCulloch who defeated Preston rival Stuart Pettman in his opening match on Wednesday.

McCulloch fancies his chances of causing an upset and could do worse than try and put the brakes on last Sunday's British Open runner-up.

"I hate slow players," said world number three O'Sullivan, from Chigwell, Essex, who became UK champion back in 1993 at the age of just 17.

"They are so negative and boring and make people switch the snooker off the television. They should be banned," he added in all seriousness.

"Without the exciting players like myself, Paul Hunter, Jimmy White, Jo hn Higgins, Stephen Hendry and Mark Williams, the sport wouldn't survive.

"I don't like playing slow but in Brighton last week, I was grinding it out because I didn't think I'd reach the final."

O'Sullivan finished second best to Hendry on the South Coast but he played his part in a brilliant final which included a record five successive century breaks.

Hendry, fives times winner of the UK crown, won the match 9-6 and contributed a total of four tons.

But defending UK champion Williams believes his Scottish stablemate has played better in the past.

Ahead of his best of 17-frames encounter with Fergal O'Brien, the Cwm-born world number one said: "I watched some of the final while I was having a game of poker and there seemed to be a century every frame.

"People were saying he was playing as well as ever in Brighton - what a load of rubbish!

"He's in great form, but if he was playing like he was when he was at the very top, he'd have to give the rest of us a start every frame. He was that good.

"I know Stephen will be drawing his pension in a couple of years but he's still capable of knocking in century after century.

"I heard a couple of the TV commentators saying it was a blessing that his cue got broken.

"I thought it was laughable. He's won all those tournaments and all that prize money with the old cue and people are saying he should be thankful."

Hendry, who faces old adversary John Parrott, and Williams could meet in another dream final next Sunday but the likes of O'Sullivan and Higgins may have other ideas.

Higgins lost to Hendry in the quarter-finals at Brighton and it is two years and a month since his last ranking tournament victory.