“I will always love you sincerely, truly, and completely.”
On May 5, the first post-2000s World Snooker Champion, Wu Yize, posted a photo on social media of himself draped in the national flag, kissing the trophy, captioning it with an everlasting love for snooker.
Winning the 2026 World Snooker Championship final made Wu Yize, born in 2003 in Lanzhou, Gansu, the first post-2000s world champion in the sport’s history. He also became the second Chinese player to claim the title after Zhao Xintong, stunning the world. At Sheffield’s Crucible Theatre, a venue that has witnessed legends like Hendry and O’Sullivan, a young Chinese player now stood center stage.
Ding Junhui, a pioneer who tirelessly broke barriers for Chinese snooker and repeatedly made history, said excitedly: “From Zhao Xintong to Wu Yize, Chinese players have stood on the highest podium at the World Championship for two consecutive years. This is not just a breakthrough; our era is arriving!”
A decade ago, Ding Junhui became the first Chinese and Asian player to reach a World Championship final, but fell short as runner-up. The world championship, the most prestigious and challenging among snooker’s Triple Crown events, remained the only major title Ding had never won. Now, the regrets of his predecessors have been fulfilled by the next generation. In 2025, Zhao Xintong won the title; this time Wu Yize repeated the feat, marking consecutive Chinese victories in the sport’s top honor.
Compared to Ding Junhui’s era, Chinese snooker now operates as a “collective force.” When Ding emerged in 2005 by winning the UK Championship, he sparked the first wave of snooker interest in China. His steady rise to a career peak in 2014 inspired waves of Chinese youngsters to pursue professional careers. But back then, Chinese snooker was largely Ding’s solo act—a lone hero, but often isolated. Today, the sport has risen as a collective: not just Zhao and Wu, but also Xiao Guodong, Si Jiahui, Zhou Yuelong, and Pang Junxu, all ranked in the world’s top 30, not to mention the still-competing veteran Ding.
Snooker is highly commercialized, requiring respect for both competitive and market dynamics. The rise of Chinese snooker owes much to honoring these dual principles. The Chinese Billiards and Snooker Association’s national team training model is not just about closed-door training; it explores a holistic system of youth development, event promotion, and market cultivation. For China’s nascent snooker market, such efforts nurture the spark and provide the soil for dreams to grow.
During the tournament, Wu Yize said after reaching the semifinals: “To have come this far, I am already satisfied. Now I hope to keep enjoying it, truly relax, and savor every moment on the table.” After winning, he admitted his victory relied on the belief that “I am willing to give everything to get it.” The “ordinary heart” in the semifinals and the “belief” in the final are not contradictory: the dream is always there, but it requires steady steps to achieve.
Compared to Ding Junhui, Wu Yize grew up in a richer snooker environment with a more developed training system, but both careers share the hallmark of family sacrifice. Ding first encountered billiards in his father’s small shop, teaching himself on an old table. When his father recognized his talent, he sold their home and moved the family to Dongguan to pursue a professional path. They lived in a cramped room, using a bed as a dining table and squeezing sideways to sleep.
Wu Yize had a similar journey. He was drawn to snooker in primary school and aspired to be a professional. His father sold their Lanzhou home and moved the family to Dongguan, devoting himself full-time to supporting his son. At 16, Wu went to train in the UK, where he and his father initially lived in a windowless apartment, sharing a single bed while grappling with language barriers. After winning the world title, Wu thanked his parents in his speech, calling them “the true champions.”
This kind of family-driven dedication stems from holding onto dreams. As a sport gradually takes root in a society, stories of total commitment for dreams are passed down like a torch. For a non-Olympic sport like snooker, the margin for error is limited, making Ding Junhui’s and Wu Yize’s stories all the more compelling.
More importantly, these stories don’t define Chinese snooker entirely. Behind the torch passed from Ding to Wu lies a foundation of increasingly solid soil and a fervent atmosphere, built by respecting competitive and market rules.