Following victory at the Crucible earlier this month, snooker stalwart Ronnie O’Sullivan further cemented his legacy as the sport’s greatest ever player after securing his seventh world title. O’Sullivan put in a trademark performance to defeat Judd Trump 18-13 to become the most successful world champion of all time.
By his side at his World Championship crowning were the Rocket’s family, as he was joined by dad Ronnie Sr and two of his children, Lily and Ronnie Jr, around the table post-match. Despite having those closest to him by his side, O’Sullivan’s family life has not always been easy.
Just days after his victory in Sheffield, the 46-year-old’s eldest daughter Taylor-Ann Magnus opened up to Mirror Sport about her broken relationship with her snooker sensation dad.
Taylor-Ann revealed that she would never let the seven-time world champion see his three-year-old granddaughter, after only meeting his daughter a handful of times when growing up. She said: “He’s not part of my life. I wouldn’t want someone like that around me and my child.”
O’Sullivan dated Taylor-Ann’s mother Sally-Ann Magnus back in the 1990s, however their relationship broke down after just two years. This is just another chapter in the Rocket’s complicated personal life, which has been filled with drama since the snooker champ was a youngster.
O’Sullivan was born in the West Midlands on December 5 1975, to Ronald Sr and Maria, who owned a number of sex and adult shops around London - which led to his mum’s imprisonment for tax evasion in 1996. The Rocket’s father also found himself behind bars after he was sent to prison for murder in 1992, when the snooker legend was just 17.
Despite the charges, O’Sullivan has seemingly always looked up to his dad as a hero, even claiming to The Sun back in 2016 that he ‘hated’ snooker, and only played the sport so that his dad could watch in jail. Eighteen years after his sentencing, Ronnie Sr was permanently released, and made an appearance alongside his son following his victory at the Crucible this month.
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Revealing to Eurosport just how special it was to have his dad by his side for his World Championship crowning, O’Sullivan said: “My dad tells me the story about what it was like when I won my first World Championship, he was in a cell on his own. The story was so different to this one… for him to be here, to see it, my kids to be here.
“Little Ronnie [his son] was really young and now he is older and it was just lovely to have them all here. They’ve enjoyed it, my dad has had a great time here, the kids have had a lovely time. I did think I would make another world final so I said [to his family] you might as well come down and experience it.”
Despite a broken relationship with eldest daughter Taylor-Ann, O’Sullivan has enjoyed a closer bond with Ronnie Jr and Lily. Following his relationship with Magnus in the 1990s, the Rocket then dated Jo Langley - the mother to his two youngest children.
Things however did not last, and following his split with Langley he began dating actress Laila Rouass in 2012, before the pair got engaged one year later. Despite a lengthy engagement their marriage never came, and two months prior to his record world title win, O’Sullivan and Rouass announced they would be calling time on their relationship.
