Shaun Murphy has told how his love for snooker came by a “complete fluke”.
The former world champion has said how his passion for the game grew at a time when his parents were going through some difficult financial problems.
Aged just eight at the time, Murphy had set his sights on a new Commodore 64 computer console as a Christmas present and asked his parents if he could have one.
But his parents couldn’t afford it. However, they had a different idea up their sleeve.
Instead, Shaun Murphy was given an old Steve Davis-branded children’s snooker table and has never looked back.
Murphy said: “I got into snooker by complete fluke.
‘I had no interest in snooker whatsoever’
“Everyone out there at a certain age will remember the old Commodore 64 and I asked mum and dad for this computer for Christmas. All my mates had it. I had no interest in snooker whatsoever.
“Little did I know at the time but my parents were going through a big financial crisis and we ended up losing our house and a lot of other things after that but they couldn’t afford the computer.
“In a last ditched attempt for a gift my mum went to Toys R Us and bought this little Steve Davis Pot Black snooker table.
“I came down stairs all bright eyed and there was this snooker table. I remember looking at it and thinking ‘What’s that? That’s not what I asked for’.
“But I just got involved with it and pretty much straight away I loved it.
“There’s pictures of me from that day when I’m knocking a few balls around. I treasure those memories. “
Murphy didn’t look back, using his first table to take up a massive interest in the game. He became a professional player in the late 1990s.
In 2005 he became world champion winning one of the most exciting finals played at Sheffield’s Crucible Theatre.
It was the first time that a qualifier won the World Championship since Terry Griffiths in 1979.
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