Ronnie O'Sullivan takes another swipe at WST as he heads for China

Ronnie O'Sullivan fired a parting shot at World Snooker Tour chiefs as he prepared to cash in on his historic eighth UK Snooker Championship title by jetting off for a lucrative Christmas exhibition in China.

O'Sullivan, whose 10-7 win over Ding Junhui on Sunday made him the oldest winner of the title, maintains the view that some officials see the sport as being better off without him, insisting "they seem to want me to hand my resignation in".

His claims have been flatly denied by the WST, who responded in a statement: "We want to work together to continue to grow the game which we have done so successfully to date, we would love Ronnie to carry on playing for as long as possible."

O'Sullivan's criticism comes amid an uneasy truce between the WST and leading players, five of whom - not including O'Sullivan - were warned that committing to an exhibition in Macau in October that clashed with the Northern Ireland Open would have constituted a breach of contract.

The Christmas Day exhibition, also in Macau and involving O'Sullivan and a number of other leading players, is not affected by such a threat, but the world number one has made no secret of his disinterest in engaging on the issue with those who run the tour.

O'Sullivan said: "As long as they want me to keep playing I'll play. But they sent me a letter the other week saying they want me to consider my future on the tour. I don't know what's going through their heads at the moment.

"From my perspective, I feel like I'm doing a pretty good job but they don't seem to think so, they seem to want me to hand my resignation in."

"It's all right if you win all of these tournaments, great. But if you get beat first round you're struggling to pay your bills and stuff."

WST contested