Nine years ago, Filipino Marlon Manalo went against conventional wisdom and took up a sport that didn't have many followers back home. In fact, snooker is still to this day so unpopular in the Philippines that there are only six tables in the whole country of 74 million people.
American pool was the craze in the Philippines and home-grown world nine-ball champion Efren 'Bata' Reyes was worshipped by millions back home.
Snooker? Get out of here.
Nobody wanted to play the game - except Manalo. The 24-year-old saloon owner from Manila knew his switch from American pool to snooker was the right one when he won the 17th Asian Championship at the Queen Elizabeth Stadium last night.
He beat Thailand's Noppadon Sangnil in a closely fought final 8-6 that took almost 10 hours to complete. 'I started playing snooker when I was 16 after initially playing nine-ball. I was told that I had potential to become champion at snooker. I'm glad I made the switch,' said Manalo, the first Filipino to win the Asian title.
One of the people who convinced Manalo to switch allegiance was Joaquin Perez de Tagle, president of the Billiard and Snooker Congress of the Philippines. 'He couldn't be number one at American pool because Bata Reyes was too good, so he became number one in the country in snooker and now he's the Asian champion,' he said.