Ding had a really hard time after being defeated by O'Sullivan in 2007 and had to struggle to stay within the top 16 rank. His performance deteriorated and he looked down the cue with a loss of confidence and the specter of losing every time he played. [Photo: Shanghai Daily]

Ding Junhui picked up a snooker cue when he was a young boy and was relentlessly breaking records until two years ago when he hit a slump. But last year he scooped up the UK championship title and is back in the winner's frame with a new lease on life, Elise Fu reports.

Ding Junhui is probably the best snooker player in China. Ever. He first picked up a cue when he was eight-and-a-half-years old and won his first championship title at the Asian Games at age 15. He is the youngest player in the game to shoot 147, the maximum break possible.

A prolific breakbuilder when on form, it took him only five seasons to compile a century of centuries, a record he shares with England's Ronnie "The Rocket" O'Sullivan. As China's first world snooker champion, he achieved all these milestones before turning 20.

Ding, 23 and known to the foreign media as "China Ding," looks like the boy who never grew up, baby-faced and dressed away from the snooker table in T-shirt and jeans.

But in the past two years, the golden boy's luster had faded and a string of poor performances rankled with the fans.

At the Wembley Masters Snooker Championships in January 2007, The Rocket's dominance in the 12th frame combined with the boisterous and hostile nature of the audience drove Ding to tears.

His reaction earned him the derisory title of "the boy who cries when losing."

In the years following that match, Ding struggled to stay within the top 16 rank as his performance deteriorated and he looked down the cue with a loss of confidence and the specter of losing every time he played.

"That period was really hard for me and I felt so tired," he said.

But by last Christmas, the tide had already turned when Ding showed up in Shanghai for a snooker contest between Shanghai and Beijing universities.

Although he lost a demonstration game with the glamorous Pan Xiaoting, lauded as the "Queen of Nine Ball" and one of China's most famous female players, the applause rang out for the man.

That's because just a few days earlier, on December 14, Ding won the 2009 United Kingdom Snooker Championship by defeating Scotland's John Higgins in the final.