He then followed this up with a run to the Quarter Finals of the Classic, beating John Virgo 5–3 to qualify, as well as Joe Johnson 5–3 in the second round, before losing 2–5 to Mike Hallett.

[3] Lawler also reached the Quarter Finals of the 2003 Welsh Open, beating players such as Stephen Maguire, Jimmy White and Michael Holt before losing 2–5 to seven time World Champion Stephen Hendry Lawler narrowly missed out on a place in the last 32 in the 2009 China Open, winning three qualifying matches, the last of which was against Matthew Stevens, to reach the venue in Beijing, only to lose 3–5 to local wildcard Yu Delu.

[4] In 2010 however, Lawler did reach the last 32 of the China Open, winning three qualifying matches against Matthew Selt, Dominic Dale, and Ricky Walden.

Also defeating wildcard Supoj Saenla 5–3, before losing to then number 8 seed Mark Selby The 2011–12 was a disastrous season for Lawler.

Apart from that he lost a lot of matches which then proved quite costly at the end of the season as he finished ranked 73, losing his place on the main tour.

He then entered the 2012 Q School and reached the semi-finals of Event 3 by beating another former professional Joe Delaney to regain his tour place for the next two seasons.

Following his Gloucester success, he continued to perform well, reaching the final qualifying round of both the UK Championship and Haikou World Open tournaments, with his results enough to move him back inside the top 64 provisionally.

He followed this up with a run to the last 16 of the third European Tour event, beating James Cahill, Liam Highfield and John Higgins before losing to Mark Allen 2–4.

Lawler failed to qualify for both the Shanghai Masters and the Australian Goldfields Open but then reached the semi-finals of the second Euro Tour (PTC) event, eventually losing 3–4 to Mark Allen in a deciding frame.

In November 2018, after winning his first round match against Anthony Hamilton at the UK Championships, Lawler was criticised for his slow play by World Snooker Chairman Barry Hearn taking an average of 39.8s per shot.