MACCLESFIELD Snooker Centre is in the frame to be re-opened as early as next month by the son of its original manager.
As a professional player, Nick Dyson has rubbed shoulders with the game's greats and hopes to chalk up another success story with the re-opening of the club at its current site on Sunderland Street.
At the age of 36 and with a young family, Nick is winding down a career which has included countless maximum 147 breaks and matches in the televised stages of major tournaments, including the World Championships where he played Jimmy White and Ken Doherty - narrowly losing by ten frames to seven against the Irishman in 2002.
He feels he is now able to invest all his free time in overseeing the management of the club - which attracted 1,000 members when it closed in December last year.
Nick said: "The opportunity came along and I thought it would be crazy to miss a chance like this.
"I've come to the end of my career in snooker, I've got a family, a young son and a mortgage.
"But a lot of snooker players, when their careers come to an end, would like to stay involved in something they know about.
"I don't know what happened with the previous owners, and it's none of my business, but you've got to move on. I just want to get the club re-opened and hopefully members will enjoy it and come back."
He first started learning how to play the game in the Queen Victoria Street centre which was set up and run by his father, Norman, from 1983 to 1988, before relocating to Sunderland Street.
While Norman has had no direct involvement in his son's new venture, Nick is happy to benefit from his years of experience. "He's been very successful in the town," he said.
Nick feels confident the business is on cue for re-opening in about five weeks' time - despite the inside of the building being completely gutted and currently looking more like a building site than a snooker club.
"This is the spine of the work now," he said. "We're going to pull up the carpets and start painting and spraying the ceiling. I'm really looking forward to it because I can see what it is going to be like."
And Nick, who used to live in Bollington before moving to Wigan with his wife Rebecca, 23, and their 17-month-old son Luke, has grand plans for the business.
All on one level, he is planning to install up to eight snooker tables, about four nine-ball pool tables and a couple of eight-ball tables.
Drinks will be brought to the players from the licensed bar, and some of the top players from the world of both snooker and pool will be invited to stage exhibitions.
Nick, who practises on his own table at a club in Bury and once had a provisional world ranking of 26, says he hopes the centre will be known as a social club and attract more than just snooker fanatics.
