Kent's Barry Hawkins parades his trophy infront of the Australian crowd

Barry Hawkins won his first ranking event title after defeating Peter Ebdon in the final of the Australian Goldfields Open.

The Ditton cueman picked up a cheque of $70,000 with Sunday's win and climbed up three places to 20th in the world leader board.

Hawkins, 33, has been in good form of late and last January won the shoot-out tournament, but Sunday’s win eclipsed anything he had done before.

It was Hawkins’ first appearance in a ranking event final after he had seen off Mark Davis 6-4 in the semi-final.

His opponent in the final, Ebdon, was in contrast going for his 10th ranking title but it was the Kent man who came good, winning the final in Bendigo 9-3.

"I’m delighted and it could be a big moment in my career hopefully," said an emotional Hawkins following the win.

"The scoreline surprised me a little bit because I thought it was going to be a really tough game.

"This will give me a lot of confidence and hopefully I can win another tournament. But it’s so tough, just to win one is an achievement."

Ebdon took the first frame in the final but Hawkins hit back with breaks of 57, 74, 106 and 114 to build a 4-1 cushion.

The players went into the interval with Hawkins (pictured) leading 5-3.

The evening session belonged to Hawkins and he won all four frames, including a 133 break to seal the victory.

Ebdon said: "Credit to Barry, I thought he played really well and his all-round game was very good.

"He’s been a winner waiting to happen for quite some time."

In the earlier rounds Hawkins had beaten Xiao Guodong 5-1, Matthew Stevens 5-2 and Matthew Selt 5-3, to earn his semi-final place against Davis.