Milkins says drunken night of shame turned career around after huge pay day
Welsh Open champion Robert Milkins has lifted the lid on the embarrassment he endured following his now infamous booze bender in Turkey a year ago.
The 46-year-old landed his biggest title to date at the weekend as he toppled Shaun Murphy 9-7 to win the Welsh Open and net a pay day of almost £300,000 including the BetVictor Series bonus and other spin-offs.
It saw the Milkman return to the world's top 16 as attentions begin to turn to the Crucible and is a far cry from where he was 12 months ago - both on and off the table.
The birthday bender in Antalya saw him hit the headlines for the wrong reasons as Milkins fell and split his chin, rowed with guests and WPBSA chief Jason Ferguson and had his stomach pumped.
He was fined by snooker chiefs and, having been left devastated by the loss of his sister just prior to the incident, sought help from former Arsenal defender Tony Adams’ mental health charity Sporting Chance.
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“What happened in Turkey was probably the best thing that has ever happened to me – in a nasty way," Milkins said.
“World Snooker Tour sorted it out for me after what I done in Turkey. I had a few issues, I told them about them and I wasn’t happy with a few things in life.
“And they got me on the Tony Adams charity, Sporting Chance. I met up with a lady in Gloucester, had six sessions in total and she said if I had more problems to go back.
“But I haven’t, I have been okay. There were terrible moments, but they are in the past now and I am looking to the future.
“And after one session I won the Gibraltar Open. I opened up to someone, telling the lady things that nobody else knows, getting everything off my chest. And it was a relief.
“I went to Gibraltar feeling a different person, and since then I have not looked back. It has been a long journey, no question. And after this win I am drained but happy.”
The father-of-three, who celebrated with kids Charlie, Elisha and Mia in Wales, admitted the huge windfall has eased financial burdens that have plagued his career.
He added: “The money means I can pay my house off, and everything else, and live comfortably – and very importantly play without any financial pressure on.
Milkins with the Welsh Open trophy (Colin Poultney/ProSports/REX/Shutterstock)“I can do that the Players Championship this week for example, the Tour Championship and the new one before the World Championship. There are more opportunities this season.
“It was really difficult all day for the final with that amount of money at stake. I felt I wasn’t playing my best all day, and I just hung in there. Luckily Shaun didn’t play his best either.
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“The pressure was so much, I wasn’t looking forward to it the night before. It was the £150,000 bonus that made it worse, people all the time telling me how much it was worth.
“I was really emotional but that was mainly because my kids were out there – I wanted them there and it was nice to have everyone in the arena.
“It was hard to take, earlier in my career, seeing people that maybe didn’t have the ability I have winning a lot more than me – but this game is about a lot more than ability.
“Most of it is about your mental state and your head, and how good you are at dealing with setbacks. And I’ve not been good at that, and my self-belief wasn’t great.
“That improved a lot after Gibraltar, though it would have been nice to have won a title before then, my 27th year on tour – perhaps if I had win one 15 years ago it could have been very different.”
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