Q+A | Simonleach

What other sporting interests do you have?

I am interested in all sports, actually, anything that excites me.

My main passion growing up was snooker. I wanted to be a player when I was, like, six or seven years old. I liked (Alex) 'Hurricane' Higgins but it was immediately decided by my family that they didn't want me hanging around snooker halls instead of going to school ... but I knew I wanted to be involved in snooker somehow.

What brought you to China?

When we were at university we were offered the opportunity to come to China so I worked for the Shangri-La hotel in Shenzhen. From the hotel I moved into working on events. I worked with a (motor) racing team and we introduced new racing formats into China.

What about your management of former world No 1 snooker player Judd Trump?

Well, there were a few reasons for that ... but the main one was that I had had my eye on Judd for a few years and I knew he was going to be a fantastic talent. I also wanted to do something fresh on the management side.

Why did you split with Judd this year?

In February, the European Tour asked me to go full-time and open a rep office and they set this one condition that I had to drop snooker. So I said 'OK'. He had already reached world No 1 and the only thing he hadn't done was win the world championship and I wasn't sure how long that was going to take.

Tym Glaser

(China Daily 08/13/2014 page23)