Ronnie O’Sullivan, 48, reveals dream of becoming world champion in different sport after retiring from snooker

RONNIE O’SULLIVAN wants to launch a career in pool after he finally decides to hang up his snooker cue.

The 48-year-old has won a record 23 Triple Crown titles and now dreams of becoming the world champion of Chinese 8-Ball pool.

AFP

Ronnie O’Sullivan is open to becoming a pool player when his snooker days are over[/caption]

O’Sullivan opened up about his potential future career ahead of this week’s Shanghai Masters.

He told Shanghai Let’s Meet: “Any cue sport fascinates me, so I’m looking at how popular Chinese 8-Ball is in China now. It’s huge, it’s massive.

“Obviously, I want to finish my snooker first – but I’ve got one eye on it maybe.

“I don’t know when – three, four, five, six years, I don’t know when that will be. But definitely when I finish snooker it’ll be something I want to go into and play some pool.

“Maybe give it a go and see if I can win the World Championships and be the best pool player in the world. That would be a challenge.”

O’Sullivan has even began thinking of the logistics ahead of his possible career change.

He said before the UK Championships last year: “I can’t keep playing snooker against the young guys, getting up for it, match-in-match-out. I don’t want to be playing just for the sake of it.

“I want to keep playing for the next 10-15 years, earning a living, having a good time. China’s a place I like to go, obviously it’s a very popular sport out there.

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“But I’ll just have to see what my sponsors are like because at the moment they’re sponsoring me as a snooker player. I’m trying to see if they’ll sponsor me as a pool player.”

It is not just the chance to be a world champion of two sports which could be tempting O’Sullivan into a switch, with pool a lucrative business.

The winner of the World Heyball Championships earlier this year pocketed a whopping £567,000.