RONNIE O’Sullivan’s bid to win three World Championship titles on the bounce remains well and truly alive after he blitzed his way into the semi-finals.

Rather than finishing quarter-final tie, O’Sullivan can sit back and prepare for his next big test after beating Shaun Murphy with a session to spare.

Leading 6-2 from Tuesday’s opening session, the defending champion won seven out of the eight frames played this morning to book his place into the last four.

And because of Barry Hawkins’ dramatic final frame win against Dominic Dale, his semi-final will be a repeat of last year’s grand final which O’Sullivan won 18-12.

Since the World Championships have been held at the Crucible from 1977, only Steve Davis and Stephen Hendry have lifted snooker’s biggest prize in three consecutive years. O’Sullivan will join them should he complete two more wins over the course of the coming days.

“I got off to a dodgy start, he could have gone 3-0 up so I got a bit lucky to stay level early in the match,” O’Sullivan said.

“I kept getting let in quite easily, I didn’t have to fight for my chances and I was scoring off Shaun’s mistakes.

“I just tried to score off every opportunity. I tried to play good safety and good match snooker.”

Elsewhere, Mark Selby only needed two frames this morning to book his place in the semi-finals after completing a comfortable 13-5 win over Alan McManus.

Selby, who reached the final seven years ago losing to John Higgins, will play the winner of the quarter-final between Judd Trump and Neil Robertson.