JAMES WATTANA (Thailand)

World ranking: 15

Age: 29

World Championship best: Semi-finalist 1993, 1997

Best ranking event performance: Winner three tournaments - Strachan Professional 1993; Thailand Open 1994; Thailand Open 1995

1998/99 ranking form: Grand Prix - R1, UK - R1, Irish - R1, Welsh - QF, Scottish - R1, Thailand - R2, China - R1, British - R1.

It has been a disappointing year for Wattana despite reaching his first ranking tournament quarter-final since the 1997 World Championship in January's Welsh Open.

He suffered an opening-match disaster at the Bangkok-hosted Asian Games in December and then received a death-threat less than three hours before he lost 5-2 to Ken Doherty in the second round at the Thailand Masters.

In 1992, Wattana's father was gunned down by an assassin in Bangkok while, some 6,000 miles away in Derby, his son compiled a maximum 147 break at the British Open, one of three he has compiled in major competitions.

The first of four Thai players to become world amateur champion in 1988, Wattana has won three ranking titles - the 1993 Strachan Professional and the Thailand Open in both 1994 and 1995.

Wattana reached the semi-finals of the Embassy World Championship in 1993, despite leading Jimmy White 5-0, he was eventually beaten 16-9.

In 1997 after victories against Graeme Dott, Stephen Lee and John Parrott at the Crucible, Wattana proved the 'Thai-phoon' is still a force to be reckoned with by pushing Hendry hard before going down 17-13.

© PA Sporting Life