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Ben Mertens
Born	13 October 2004 (age 20); Wetteren, Belgium
Sport country	Belgium
Nickname	The Boy Wonder
Professional	2022–present
Highest ranking	70 (July 2023)
Current ranking	94 (as of 2 December 2024)
Best ranking finish	Last 16 (2023 Welsh Open)

Ben Mertens (born 13 October 2004) is a Belgian professional snooker player. He won the World Open Under-16 Snooker Championships in 2018.

Career

Ben Mertens is from Wetteren. When he was 12 years old, he reached the 2nd round of the 2017 EBSA European Under-18 Snooker Championship. At the 2018 event he got to the quarter-finals, where he lost to the later champion Jackson Page.

He won the Belgian U18 championship in 2018.^[2] In August 2018 he played in a professional ranking tournament for the first time, and beat Adam Stefanow in the first round of the 2018 Paul Hunter Classic.^[3]

In October 2018, when he was thirteen years old, he won the World Open Under-16 Snooker Championships, becoming the first male Belgian snooker world champion (Wendy Jans is a multiple winner of the senior women's world championship).^[3]

In January 2019, he defeated Michael White, then ranked #36 in the world, at a snooker tournament in Bruges.^[4]

At the 2019 Snooker Shoot-Out, a ranking tournament for which he got a wild card, he beat James Wattana in the first round.^[5]

In March 2020 he lost in the semi-finals of the EBSA European Under-21 Snooker Championships to later champion Aaron Hill.^[6]

In July 2020 he defeated James Cahill in the first round of the World Championship qualifiers, becoming the youngest player ever to win a match in the World Championships. This record was broken by Liam Davies, who was two days younger than Mertens when he won his first match at the 2022 World Snooker Championship qualifiers.^[7]

In June 2022 turned professional after winning the EBSA European Under-21 Snooker Championships and gained a two-year tour card for the 2022–23 and 2023–24 snooker seasons.^[8]

Performance and rankings timeline

Tournament	2017/ 18	2018/ 19	2019/ 20	2020/ 21	2021/ 22	2022/ 23	2023/ 24	2024/ 25
Ranking^[9]^{[nb 1]}	^{[nb 2]}	^{[nb 2]}	^{[nb 2]}	^{[nb 2]}	^{[nb 2]}	^{[nb 3]}	72	^{[nb 4]}
Ranking tournaments
Championship League	Non-Ranking Event			A	A	RR	RR	RR
Xi'an Grand Prix	Tournament Not Held							1R
Saudi Arabia Masters	Tournament Not Held							3R
English Open	A	A	A	A	A	LQ	LQ	LQ
British Open	Tournament Not Held				A	1R	1R	2R
Wuhan Open	Tournament Not Held						2R	LQ
Northern Ireland Open	A	A	A	A	A	LQ	LQ	LQ
International Championship	A	A	A	Tournament Not Held			LQ	1R
UK Championship	A	A	A	A	A	LQ	LQ	LQ
Shoot Out	A	2R	A	2R	A	2R	1R
Scottish Open	A	A	A	A	A	LQ	1R	LQ
German Masters	A	LQ	A	A	A	LQ	1R
Welsh Open	A	A	A	A	A	3R	1R
World Open	A	A	A	Tournament Not Held			LQ
World Grand Prix	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ
Players Championship	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ
Tour Championship	NH	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ	DNQ
World Championship	A	A	LQ	LQ	LQ	LQ	LQ
Former ranking tournaments
Paul Hunter Classic	LQ	2R	NR	Tournament Not Held
WST Classic	Tournament Not Held					2R	Not Held
European Masters	A	A	A	1R	A	LQ	2R	NH
Former non-ranking tournaments
Paul Hunter Classic	Ranking		1R	Tournament Not Held
Six-red World Championship	A	A	A	Not Held		LQ	Not Held

Performance Table Legend
LQ	lost in the qualifying draw	#R	lost in the early rounds of the tournament (WR = Wildcard round, RR = Round robin)	QF	lost in the quarter-finals
SF	lost in the semi-finals	F	lost in the final	W	won the tournament
DNQ	did not qualify for the tournament	A	did not participate in the tournament	WD	withdrew from the tournament

NH / Not Held				means an event was not held.
NR / Non-Ranking Event				means an event is/was no longer a ranking event.
R / Ranking Event				means an event is/was a ranking event.
MR / Minor-Ranking Event				means an event is/was a minor-ranking event.

^ It shows the ranking at the beginning of the season
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e He was an amateur
^ New players on the Main Tour don't have a ranking
^ Players qualified One Year Ranking List started the season without ranking points

Career finals

Amateur finals: 4 (3 titles)

Outcome	No.	Year	Championship	Opponent in the final	Score
Winner	1.	2018	World Open Under-16 Snooker Championships	Aaron Hill	4–3
Winner	2.	2021	EBSA European Under-18 Snooker Championships	Julien Leclercq	4–3
Winner	3.	2022	EBSA European Under-21 Snooker Championships	Florian Nüßle	5–1
Runner-up	1.	2022	EBSA European Snooker Championships	Andres Petrov	3–5