Marco Fu

FORMER Premier League Snooker Champion Marco Fu returns to the competition last year for the first time since Spring 2005.

Fu, who triumphed in the 2003 Premier League with a 9-5 victory over Mark Williams in the final, returned to the top ten of the world rankings to force himself back into the competition.

He came within a frame of landing the biggest title of his career at the 2008 UK Championship. The Hong Kong ace started off at Telford with a 9-6 defeat of Barry Hawkins, then beat Matthew Stevens 9-5, Joe Perry 9-7 and Ali Carter 9-7 to reach his first UK final.

Up against Shaun Murphy, he came from 8-6 down to lead 9-8, but Murphy levelled the match then edged the deciding frame, helped by a fluke on the pink off the penultimate red. "Even at 9-8 up I didn't feel settled," admitted Fu. "I was out of sorts all day. I'm disappointed to lose although I can take some positives from this tournament as I've got my confidence back."

Fu also got to the quarter-finals of the Shanghai Masters and the Welsh Open. His World Snooker Championship campaign started promisingly with a 10-4 victory over Joe Swail, but he then fell 13-3 to Murphy. "Shaun played really well but from start to finish," said Fu, who finished the season at No 8 in the world rankings, becoming the first Chinese player to hold a top-eight position. "I really struggled and performed at only 10 or 20 per cent of my ability."

Fu would certainly have been considered as a contender for the unwanted title of ‘best player never to win a ranking event’ when the 2007/08 season began, but thankfully for the popular Hong Kong cueman, he shook that monkey off his back in the second tournament of the season.

The Aberdeen Exhibition and Conference Centre was the scene for Fu’s greatest triumph as he went all the way to the first prize in the Grand Prix.

After beating the likes of Shaun Murphy and Ding Junhui in the initial round robin phase, Fu went on to knock out John Higgins, Liu Song and Gerard Greene so set up a final clash with Ronnie O’Sullivan.

The Rocket was considered favourite – but Fu has a tendency to bring out his best form against the biggest names, and so it proved again as he played the finest snooker of his career in a 9-6 victory .His 60 clearance from 58-0 behind to win the 14th frame was one of the best breaks of the season, and Fu needed just one chance in the next frame to seal the match, making a cool 76.

”There was a period of two to three years when I was struggling to get to the last 16 of tournaments, let alone win one,” admitted Fu. “In the last two years I’ve felt good because I knew my game was heading in the right direction. I’ve made a lot of technical changes and it has taken me a while to get used to them. Ronnie has been my idol in snooker and he tends to bring the best out of me because I always know it will be a quick and open game. I’ve never played better than I did tonight.”

The remainder of the season did not bring any comparable highlights for Fu, though he did reach the quarter-finals of the UK Championship. He finished the campaign on a positive note by qualifying for the Crucible, and was handed an intriguing contest against fellow Asian star Ding Junhui.

Fu battled bravely from 5-1 down at the Crucible but succumbed 10-9. “This match was huge for the both of us with everybody back home watching, and he handled the pressure very well, considering he is still at a young age,” said Fu.

Two years earlier at Sheffield, the man from Happy Valley knocked out Alan McManus, Stephen Maguire and Ken Doherty to reach the semi-finals. He then came from 15-9 down to 16-16 against Peter Ebdon only for a tearful Ebdon to take the last frame with a nerveless break of 54.

Fu first grabbed the attention of the snooker world in 1998 when he beat seven players, including Ebdon and O’Sullivan, to reach the final of the Grand Prix, where he went down 9-2 to Lee. The following year he was voted WPBSA Newcomer of the Year.