Ronnie O’Sullivan claims snooker bosses’ tactics to make players take part in the Northern Ireland Open were verging on blackmail.
And the seven-time world champion O’Sullivan insists he could even skip the World Championship at the Crucible if the right exhibition offer came up in Asia.
The issue of players’ freedom to enjoy bumper sideline paydays has erupted over the past 10 days and led to governing body warnings about legal action.
Mark Selby, John Higgins and Luca Brecel were among those to snub the Belfast event to play a big-money exhibition in Macau. That has now been postponed after World Snooker Tour pressure.
And the Rocket is playing in a lucrative exhibition in Shanghai this week along with Judd Trump, Mark Williams, Jack Lisowski and Ding Junhui.
World Snooker Tour originally refused to sanction that…before doing a U-turn. But O’Sullivan and Co were ordered to play in Northern Ireland, and keep a media and social media blackout in Shanghai.
But O’Sullivan predicts ever-more clashes with WST, with a larger cast of players now getting the big-money offers he has enjoyed for 10 years.
O’Sullivan said: “It was almost blackmail to those playing in the Shanghai exhibition – to say you have to do this and do that.
“It would make most players just not want to play there so much. Most players would take these letters as a threat.
“These days I would just say ‘I am not playing – what are you going to do about it?’ And I will always pay attention to my tennis elbow, and my mental health.
“Get a decent promoter on board in the UK, and stop treating the players like a piece of sh!t. Do it properly. Or – don’t get upset when players complain.
“WST will try and change the players’ contract and clamp down. But the more they do that, the worse they might make it for themselves.
“They will say ‘You can’t play in anything, you can’t have a cue in your hand, anywhere, whether it is streamed or not, if it is not a tour event’.
“And there will be top players who won’t like that, especially after this. But I am doing my own thing, I have a lot going on in China – don’t be surprised if I missed the World Championships.
“What has happened with these exhibitions in Shanghai and Macau and the fallout – it is going to happen again.
“And often those promoters don’t want 128 players like WST. These people might only want the top 16, top eight at most. They don’t want to risk me, Trump, Selby or Higgins losing in qualifiers.
“The model is f****d up – they have got it wrong. It doesn’t support 128 players.
“These threatening letters the rest are getting now – I was getting them years ago. And it was then I decided just to make it work for me. Plus I had Damien Hirst’s top lawyers available for free.
“I have got my own breakaway going on really. I know my value, and what I am worth. Players want to take advantage of these offers – and rightly so. They have got families and kids.”
